The Paradox Job
by Croik
Summary: Arthur origin story  A/E, A/OMC .  The first time Arthur shared dreams, he died a horrible death. Two weeks later he was addicted: to dreams, to power, to freedom, and to that stubborn bastard, Eames.
1. Chapter 1

Inception, its characters and settings, do not belong to me, and are being used here without permission and for no profit. This fic is rated NC-17 for graphic violence, sex, language, addiction, and non-con. Written for the Inception Reverse Bang with partner birddi.

**The Paradox Job**

Part 1

* * *

><p>"Come on," Arthur said as he tucked his phone into his shoulder. "You could at least give me a challenge."<p>

"Sorry to shame your genius with my pathetic request," Roger said in his ear. "But it'll only take you, what, five minutes?"

Arthur held up a silver tie to his neck, trying to get it to fall straight so that he could compare it to the rest of his outfit. Too formal. He tossed it aside and tried a dull blue one instead. "If that. But you know Professor Robbinson will catch it. She's looks for that sort of thing."

"The semester is over-why would she look? It's only point one anyway."

"Point one makes a world of difference to an engineer," Arthur teased, deadpan, as he pulled the tie around his neck and fashioned it into a Windsor. "Point one separates success from failure, life from death itself-"

Roger sighed in exasperation. "Do you want the fifty bucks or not?"

Arthur smiled, and held the phone away from his ear a moment so he could stand up straight and appraise his wardrobe choice properly. Satisfied, he moved into the other room of his apartment and sat down in front of his laptop. "You'd better have it for me tonight, in cash," he said as he set the phone down and went to work. "My internship starts Monday and I need a haircut."

"Your hair...is superb. You don't need a haircut."

"Tonight, in cash," Arthur repeated. His fingers danced across the keys, carrying him effortlessly past passwords and various security measures. Professor Robbinson's advanced physics, 303. A 3.9 became a perfect 4.0: first trick he had taught himself, though he had never needed to use it for himself. "I'm on my way out now. And next time think of something harder, all right?"

"Yeah, sure," Roger laughed. "If I ever need some corporate espionage done, you'll be at the top of my list. Wait, does that mean you already-"

"I'll see you there," Arthur said, and he hung up. He shut down his laptop and was tying his shoes when his phone trilled with an incoming text message. He turned it toward him so he could read while he finished with the laces.

_I hear you're good at finding things._

Arthur frowned at the unfamiliar number. He grabbed his keys and wallet and headed out; as he waited for the elevator he texted back, _Depends__ on what you're looking for._

The elevator opened, and he stepped inside. While the elevator stopped on the third floor to pick up a pair of elderly women, he got a reply: _Let's meet. I have a job for you, Arthur._

Arthur raised an eyebrow at the screen. He knew his name had gotten around recently, but not to the point where strangers were propositioning him for work directly. The hairs on the back of his neck prickled. _I don't meet,_ he typed back. _Tell me what you're looking for._

_I'll tell you when you meet me, _the stranger responded.

"Yeah, right," Arthur muttered. The women let off in the lobby but he rode the elevator to the parking garage in the basement. _I don't meet,_ he sent again, and then shoved his phone into his pocket, thinking that was the end of it. He hadn't gotten as far as he had by being stupid when it came to dealing with criminals.

The elevator doors opened, and he stepped out.

* * *

><p>The party was dreadfully generic. Everyone was dressed to their best and Arthur still managed to stand out, weaving through the familiar faces as they gossiped over their parents' wine. In an hour or two the alcohol would loosen tongues and make things more interesting, but until then they were just another group of Ivy League socialites-in-training patting themselves on the back for one more semester of grad school behind them. Arthur was content to drift about, catching the tail ends of conversations, reconnecting with faces he hadn't seen since winter break. As always, everyone was happy to see him.<p>

Blond, spectacled Roger Hunt found him in the kitchen. "There you are! I've been texting you all night."

They shook hands and Roger tried to be smooth, sliding a wad of cash into the greeting, but Arthur rolled his eyes. He counted the money in plain sight and slipped it into his wallet. "Really? I must not have heard." He reached for his phone to check, but his vest pocket was empty. He checked his jacket and pants and still didn't find it. "Damn."

"Lost it?" Roger asked, surprised. "That's not like you."

"I wouldn't have left home without it," Arthur said, trying to remember the last text message he'd sent. He held out his hand. "Let me borrow yours."

Roger handed it over, and Arthur dialed in his own number and hit send. It rang twice and hung up without going to voicemail.

"Shit." Arthur straightened up and looked around the party, though he knew there was no chance of him spotting anything useful. "Someone has it." He waved at Roger. "Go move around, see if you can hear my ringtone."

Roger looked doubtful, but he nodded and headed into the living room. Arthur went the opposite way, further into the house, and dialed again. The phone rang only once and then hung up again, and with a scowl he thought, _If__ you're going to steal it, you should at least turn it off until I leave the party._

He was about to dial again when a shout rose from the back. People were cheering and wincing loudly, and as Arthur followed someone burst through the patio door shouting, "Fight! Fight!"

_Well_, Arthur thought, picking up the pace, _at least that's something new._

A ring had formed in the back yard, and at the center three men were tangled in a brawl. Another was already on the ground nursing a broken nose. Arthur pushed to the front of the cheering crowd but by then it was almost over: a man in a striped shirt twisted, felling one of his opponents with a sound uppercut. The line of his ribs to his wrist was effortless and picture perfect. The remaining man charged, aiming low, but striped-shirt turned again and grabbed him by his belt. Using his attacker's momentum against him he flung him into the backyard minibar to a roar of approval.

Arthur blinked. _Damn._

He tried to get a look at the stranger's face, but as soon as the fight ended everyone flooded forward, patting him on the back and offering him drinks. The man laughed, his voice deep and throaty, carrying above the commotion. It prickled goose bumps up Arthur's arms with a sensation of dj vu.

"What were they fighting over?" he asked a woman next to him.

"Fuck if I know," she laughed.

Everyone continued to buzz over their unexpected hero, and with a sigh Arthur turned away. He hit redial on Roger's phone and hoped that with so many people gathered he might get lucky.

Immediately he heard the indie pop song that Roger had insisted be his ringtone. He turned, craning his neck to see over the crowd, but there were several people with a phone in their hands or at their ear, and he couldn't pick out his own among them. It stopped a moment later, but rather than going silent a man's voice emptied out of the speaker. "Yeah?"

Arthur's spine went rigid. He glanced from man to man but still couldn't be sure. "Who is this?" he asked.

"Who's _this_?" the stranger returned in a strong British accent.

"This is Roger," Arthur said carefully. He moved through the crowd but then his eye caught on the man in stripes, and the smartphone pressed to his ear. He stopped. "I'm looking for Arthur."

From where Arthur was he could only see the man's back: a collared shirt stretched over broad shoulders, a stern neck, short brown hair. "That's funny," the man said, his cheeks wrinkling with a grin. "I'm looking for Arthur, too."

Arthur felt a flutter in his chest that was part curiosity, mostly apprehension. _Is he the one that texted me?_ he thought, trying to circle around so he could see a face. "What for?" he asked lightly. "One fight wasn't enough for you?"

He laughed again, turning his head so that Arthur caught a glimpse of rough whiskers and full lips. "Oh, no. I'm sure he could take me."

That was even more curious. Arthur slunk closer, his pulse beginning to rise. "You think so? Not after what I just saw."

His voice lowered. "You were watching?"

_Why does it sound like he's teasing me?_ Arthur was only a few steps away. "You were hard to miss," he said.

The stranger looked the other way, and Arthur almost stopped short again when he realized that he was searching for him, too. "Like what you saw?"

Arthur snorted. "Maybe if I knew what it was about."

The stranger turned and spotted him, and Arthur froze. The slow smile that turned his lips was unexpected, and Arthur remained very still as he moved closer, not knowing how to react. _We're in public,_ he told himself as the man stopped in front of him. But then he remembered the fight only a moment ago and was uncertain again.

"Nothing, really." The man pulled the phone away from his ear and offered it. "They pissed me off."

Arthur accepted the phone and hung up the call on both ends. "All right," he said, tucking the phones into his pockets. "You have my attention. What is it you want?"

His eyebrows rose. "To start with?"

Arthur sighed, thinking, _This__ is why I don't meet clients._ "I'm Arthur," he blurted out. "So what is it you want?"

"You just gave it to me," he replied slickly. He took Arthur's hand and shook it. "Hello, Arthur."

His fingers were hot and sweaty, and Arthur hated the little shiver it spread up his spine. "Look, this is a party," he said as he retrieved his hand. "I don't do business in public. So if you want to talk, just text me again later." When the man stared at him in confusion, he frowned. "You _are_ the one that texted me, aren't you?"

"Not the foggiest idea what you mean," he said. He waved to one of the guys behind him and was eagerly handed a beer.

"Seriously?" Arthur's ears reddened with irritation, but when he studied the man's face, he realized that he was telling the truth. "Then why did you steal my phone?"

"I didn't." He motioned toward his unconscious brawl-mates with his bottle-the rest of the party was continuing around them, stepping over them when necessary. "Didn't mean to, anyway. I knicked it from them."

Arthur looked, and when he squinted he realized they looked familiar. _Unhappy customers, maybe?_ He couldn't place them right away, but he took his phone out and snapped pictures, sure that he it would come to him later. "Then, um, thanks," he said awkwardly. He gave his phone a shake. "For this."

"Tell Roger I said hi," he said, and with a wink he turned away.

Arthur frowned at his back. He was already embarrassed, but being so abruptly dismissed infuriated him. Scowling, he marched back into the house. _This party is pointless anyway,_ he thought as he moved through the halls. _I might as well leave._ He checked his phone for any messages he might have missed. _Or try to get some real work. _

He was considering texting the stranger back after all when five steely fingers wrapped over his face.

* * *

><p>Arthur opened his eyes to blood drying in dead grass. His lungs swelled and immediately heaved with the intake of smoke and dirt, and he doubled over, coughing into his sleeve. The air was dry but sweat streamed through his hair and down his back, making a sauna of his heavy fatigues and helmet. Gunfire rippled overhead as he pressed into the ditch and tried to regain his bearings.<p>

"First dead body?" a man said nearby.

Arthur lifted his head. The blood stood out to him again and he followed it down the sloping embankment to its source: a crumpled soldier with a face full of gore. He stared at it, blinking and uncomprehending.

More gunfire sounded, close enough to make Arthur's ears ring. He winced and glanced to the soldier beside him, who was pressed on his belly and firing across the dusty road into tall grass. Dressed for combat as he was only the barest of his features were visible: a long, jutting nose; narrow eyes beneath hooded sockets; dark stubble spattering a sharp-angled chin. His breath huffed through flared nostrils and his lip curled upward with every report of his rifle like that of a barking jackal.

Arthur rolled onto his stomach and crawled up the bank on his elbows. His heart was thundering but his mind became surprisingly lucid, and he knew with a kind of omniscient clarity that he was in no actual danger. _I'm not a soldier_, he thought even as he pulled the rifle away from his chest and braced the stock to his shoulder. _I'm not fighting terrorist insurgents._ He glanced to the man again and tried to copy his position. _That's not my friend in the ditch._

His finger curled around the trigger. He squeezed, not enough to fire, feeling the weapon tense in his grip as if it were a living thing baring teeth. Sweat burned in the corner of his eyes and his sight wavered, smearing his distant targets into daylight ghosts. _I'm not a soldier,_ Arthur told himself again as he adjusted his hands, digging metal into the meat of his palm. _And they're not real._

_I'm dreaming._

Arthur squeezed. The rifle screamed and a hail of bullets issued forth, swerving over the dirt road and into the cover of his enemies. Every shot was a perfectly ruptured skull. From so far away he couldn't even see the blood.

The soldier next to him laughed. "I hate greens like you," he said.

"I'm dreaming," Arthur replied. It was difficult to feel proud of himself given that knowledge; all he had to do was aim and pull, aim and pull, and he could win wars. "Why wouldn't I be a perfect shot?"

The soldier stopped shooting to eye him. He was familiar, and after some squinting Arthur realized that it must have been Trevor Hullz, the TA to Professor Miller during his sophomore year. He always had been a pushy know-it-all and his new role suited him.

"So you figured that out already," Trevor said, looking doubtful.

"Figured out what?" Arthur took in deep breath and was no longer bothered by the crowding dust. He fitted his finger to the trigger again, aimed, and pulled. Another man fell dead.

Trevor set his rifle down and unstrapped the handgun from his shin. "Then I guess we'd better move on."

He pushed up on his knees, and Arthur was about to warn him about being picked off when he felt the muzzle press into his right shoulder. The gunshot wasn't as loud as his rifle but the reverberations rippled through his entire body. His shoulder blade splintered, sending shards of bone into his muscles, into his lungs; he could feel each piece shredding a separate path through him. The pain hit a moment later, and Arthur screamed as the bullet exploded from his chest in a burst of blood.

"How's that?" Trevor snarled. "Are you still a perfect shot now?"

Arthur tried to grab for the jagged wound, but his body was too heavy and his rifle was still strapped to his chest and in the way. With every beat of his panicked heart he felt warmth pulse out of him, and in senseless desperation he thought, _Stop, stop beating, I'll bleed to death._ Tears mingled with the sweat already on his face as he struggled to roll onto his side.

Trevor dropped onto his back as bullets continued to shriek overhead. "Come on, kid," he taunted. "You're dreaming. It's just like a Hollywood movie, right? The hero never dies from a shot to the shoulder."

Arthur slumped onto his uninjured left. The words seeped into him, and as he gasped for breath with half a set of working lungs he told himself that Trevor was right. His body wouldn't believe it. His skin was cold and shivering, and it took all his strength to grab up his rifle again and swing the muzzle toward his attacker.

"If I'm the hero," he said hoarsely, "what's that make you?"

He fired, and missed at first, but he kept his finger to the trigger, spraying lead until the bullets pierced Trevor's helmet and splattered his brain out the other side. The body twitched and its eyes rolled for a few seconds later, and Arthur watched in sick fascination. Once it had stopped he collapsed onto his back and closed his eyes.

_I just need a moment,_ he thought, shoving his palm into hole in his chest. _I'll catch my breath and then I'll finish this war. That's what I'm supposed to be doing, right?_ _It's just a dream. Right? _Copper welled in his throat and he swallowed it back with a grimace. He knew it wasn't really his blood but the taste was thick and pungent in his stomach, and he began to doubt. A fear was bubbling in his chest that was so potent it had to be real.

The earth shook beneath him. When he opened his eyes again the sky above him was dulling from blue to gray, and a thin line of high clouds began to turn, aiming downward like a plummeting aircraft. All around the already dry grass shriveled, leaving only rusty stains on bald dirt, and somewhere behind him unintelligible voices cried out in terror. Everything was dying; everything was falling apart.

Arthur watched the swift decay with wide eyes. The quaking grew worse and cracks formed all along the bank. They opened like toothy maws, swallowing Trevor's suddenly rotting corpse in bottomless fissures. When the ground under Arthur began to buckle he forced himself on his hands and knees and crawled, in panic and agony, away from his approaching death.

_I'm dreaming. I'm dreaming._

He fell through. The wind was cold to piercing, biting every bead of sweat off his face and neck. He grabbed at the stony walls and broke fingers in his attempts to halt the mad descent but his momentum was too great. He fell, and spun, and tumbled into the crevasse until the opening was only a narrow crescent of dim light above.

Arthur awoke with a full body gasp. He jerked in his chair as if it had broken his fall, his hands white and pained around the arms. For long moments he fought for breath against his burning lungs and rubbed his feet against rough carpet until he was positive he was alive and grounded and awake.

"That's what you get for shooting me," a man said close to his ear.

Arthur recoiled, but his limbs were still heavy and weak, and he couldn't focus. His forearm stung and then the man moved away. "What... What the fuck," he wheezed. He rubbed his eyes and at last was able to take in his surroundings: he was in a cheap motel, empty beer bottles on the table and a cigarette half crushed but still smoking in the tray. "Where am I?"

The soldier from his dream picked up the cigarette and took a slow pull before stamping it out completely. He was dressed in baggy jeans and a white undershirt, showing off hints of ink between his shoulder blades and over the rise of his hips. His limbs were long, making acute angles of his knees when he sank into the chair opposite Arthur. As they stared at each other across the short distance Arthur saw that it wasn't Trevor Hullz after all. In fact, he wasn't sure how he could have ever mistaken the two.

This was the client he had refused to meet in person. This was a long-lined thug with scars in his arms and an empty wallet, the kind Arthur had friends to deal with on his behalf. This was a mistake playing out in slow motion.

"Remember me now?" the man asked.

Arthur rubbed his jaw and found it sore. He looked at the man's long fingers and remembered them wrapped over his face, wrapped up in his necktie. "You kidnapped me," he said. He spotted his suit jacket on the bed and sagged at the thought of his doubtlessly ransacked wallet. More pressing a concern, however, was the spot of blood on his arm. He pressed down with thumb. "Did you drug me?" He stood. "You fucking junkie, did you-"

"The needle was clean and brand new, if that's what you're worried about." He gestured to the floor. "Watch your step."

Arthur followed his pointing, and started back. Seated between them was a mess of metal and glass and rubber: two bottles filled with gold liquid were nestled within a ragged apparatus of plungers and coiled IV tubing. Arthur's disgust turned to keen interest as he crouched down and inspected the foreign and yet instantly recognizable device.

"Where did you get this?" he asked, not looking up.

"Africa." He lit a fresh cigarette. "You could say it cost me an arm and a leg."

Arthur's gaze flickered to the man's frayed left pant leg, and what looked like burn scars creeping down his ankle and over the top of his bare foot. Knowing what he did about the substance in the bottles-rumors and hearsay, but believable-he was not surprised. "Then why waste it on me?"

"Because I need you to do something for me."

Arthur's pulse hitched but his face remained calm as he stood. He had done business with plenty of shady characters, and was determined not to be intimidated by even this rough specimen. "Who are you?" he asked sternly. "We don't have anything to talk about until I get a name."

"Bone," he introduced himself with a jut of his chin. "Benjamin Bone." He pointed with his cigarette. "Not Ben, Benny, Bones, Boned, or Boner. Benjamin, or Bone. That's it. Got it, kid?"

"Arthur," he corrected. "Just Arthur."

Satisfied, Bone waved at the chair. "Sit down; now we've got something to talk about."

Arthur did so. As his hands flexed against the arms he was reminded of the dream he had just exited, and his breath threatened to come faster with the memory. Whatever the source of his visions the adrenaline in his blood was real, and it made him anxious on top of the already impending conversation. "What can I do for you, Mr. Bone?"

Bone's eyebrows perked at the choice of address. "I need you to help me find one of these," he said, nudging the device between them with his toe.

Arthur glanced to it and back. "It's right there."

"A real one, smartass." He blew smoke and Arthur's nose twitched. "Two weeks ago someone swiped one of the original five PASIVs out of General Keller's home in Maryland. I know 'cause I was going to steal it myself. Tracked it out here but apparently it got sold off to some rich fuck in the city."

Arthur's face remained impassive. "And you think with my connections I can figure out who bought it, so that you can steal it properly this time," he surmised.

"That's the idea, Arthur."

It was not an unusual request, save for the item involved. Arthur had helped all manner of people find all manner of things in the city he'd grown up in, and something as rare and valuable as a military PASIV wouldn't stay a secret for long. "I assume you want this done as soon as possible," he said. "You won't be the only one after it." He looked Bone up and down. "And it won't be easy to extract, either."

Bone's lip twitched. "Let me worry about that part."

"I have to worry about that part," Arthur said. "Because if you get caught what's keeping you from selling me out?"

Bone rocked forward, leaning his elbows on his knees. "Do I look like a rat to you?"

Arthur had to admit, he didn't think so. He glanced again to the almost-PASIV on the floor and the hairs on the back of his neck prickled. "Then it's two thousand up front," he said. "Three more when I find it. If you want my help planning the extraction that's another ten, twenty if I'm needed on site. My hands don't get dirty."

Bone listened attentively, and then replied, "I don't have any money."

Arthur straightened at the unexpected admission. "You won't find a more reasonable price for what you're asking, considering what that PASIV is worth."

"I know." Bone took a slow breath of his cigarette. "But I really don't have any money. Thought I'd pay you another way."

_You're not worth it,_ Arthur thought involuntarily, though his gaze lingered briefly on the stern curve of a well-sculpted bicep. When he noticed Bone staring at the device between them he quickly caught on. "With this?"

"Won't need it if I can get a real one," he said. "I don't have a lot of compound left but it's enough that I can show you how to use it. Then you can buy your own compound from the dealers out west and everyone's happy."

There were times when dealing with criminals was not worth the irritation they brought. "I don't want it," said Arthur. "I'm not a junkie and even if I was I wouldn't pay you to shoot me again."

"Then let me show you something else." Bone set his cigarette in the tray and crouched down, messing with the device. "You'll see what I mean, I promise."

He offered up one of the needles, and Arthur couldn't help but narrow his eyes on the pale scars marking the inside of his forearm. His stomach churned, but he was just curious enough to see what a grunt like Bone had in mind. He licked his lips and leaned forward to accept the needle.

Bone retook his chair and slid the second needle into his arm. His pupils were already dilated by the time his toe stretched over the trigger. Arthur followed his example, wincing as his skin was pierced. He was only granted a moment for disgust before the drug seeped into his vein and he was asleep.

Arthur opened his eyes to an open panorama of soaring blue sky and rippling sand. Cold, salty waves lapped at his bare ankles and spread goose bumps up to his knees. When he looked left and right the ocean spread out before him, endless and undulating. He had seen it before, but never so simply, without any interruption from shipping piers or luxury hotels or summer homes. There was only blue sky, and blue water, and a glimmer of whitecaps in the distance to separate one from the other.

Bone stood beside him. He was inexplicably clean-shaven and he no longer reeked of smoke and motel carpet. "Not bad, is it."

Arthur breathed in the ocean air, tasting it at the back of his throat. "It's just the ocean," he said. But when he wiggled his toes and warm, wet sand oozed between them it gave him boyish thrill. "Might be prettier at night."

Bone snorted. Arthur heard breath hiss through his teeth, and to his surprise the sun began to sink rapidly toward the horizon. "Kinda strange," Bone said, "that you can tell so easily you're dreaming."

Arthur watched their shadows lengthen across the beach with a prickle of fascination. "I can always tell." For the first time he thought it was something of a shame.

The sun drooped until it touched the water, bathing it in brilliant orange for brief and gorgeous moments before extinguishing completely. In its place rose a full moon, gleaming silver and impossibly large, filling a quarter of the sky. Arthur almost staggered beneath its enormity. A strange feeling came over him as the air grew cool and soft against his cheeks.

"Come on." Bone slapped his shoulder and stepped back. "I'll race you."

Arthur started. "To where?"

"As far as we can go," he said, and when he smiled, he looked like an entirely different person. He turned and jogged down the shoreline.

Arthur shook his head, but he followed. Sand squished beneath his feet and he strayed closer to the water's edge so that he could feel the waves splash against his ankles. He met Bone stride for stride, their shadows a singular pillar, and when Bone sped up so did he. When he sped up so did Bone. Back and forth they traded brief leads, racing faster until they were sprinting full out across the unending beach. They left gouged prints in their wake to be swallowed by the ocean moments later.

Arthur ran. He ran until his thighs ached and his lungs burned. When his flapping shirt became a hindrance he shed it and delighted in every cold kiss of night air to his sweat-laden skin. It was the simplest of things, just to run down an empty stretch of land without destination or purpose, but as the sky and the sea blurred together he felt as if he was regaining part of himself. He was as wild and uncluttered as the world that was becoming ever more real around him. It was freedom.

He awoke, again, with a gasp. The stench of the cheap motel was choking, and he leaned forward, hating it so much he thought he'd be sick. All that was left of his beach was the sweat on his palms and a distant soreness in his legs, as if it had been days ago since he ran himself to exhaustion and was at long last recovering from its effects.

Bone took his wrist and removed his needle. "You all right?"

Arthur rubbed his arm. "Yeah. Fine."

Bone glanced up into his face, and Arthur frowned in anticipation of an "I told you so," but it didn't come. The eyes on him were intense and almost hopeful, so much so that Arthur had to look away. All his better sense told him to walk. "I need a day to think about your proposal," he said. "I don't usually do business in trades." He scoffed. "Or with kidnappers."

Bone frowned as he packed up the device and slid it into a weary denim sack. "Then I'll see you tomorrow."

Arthur grabbed his jacket off the bed and checked the pockets; his wallet was still present, all cash and cards accounted for. He gripped his car keys tightly as he saw himself out without another word.

Outside, the parking lot was slick with May rain. It smelled like smashed worms and exhaust, and as Arthur hurried to his car his nose wrinkled with disgust. He could still taste salt at the back of his throat but it was rapidly vanishing in favor of highway grit.

_This is ridiculous._ Arthur turned the key and shifted into reverse. _I don't need this shit._

* * *

><p>Ever since Arthur had been young, he had always been able to tell when he was dreaming. He rarely remembered any dream past waking, but while he was in them each one was like a chapter in some incomprehensible story, and he an actor playing every role. He stuck to the mold and did as he was supposed to, every time.<p>

That night he dreamt of the beach. It was as wide and empty and pointless as it had been in Bone's mind, refreshingly so, but when he tried to run everything smeared together. His legs became lead weights and the ground rocked, trying to overturn him. There was no clarity and when he woke up, frustrated and disappointed, he couldn't figure out right away if any of it had actually happened.

* * *

><p>The next day Arthur and Bone played basketball on the deck of an aircraft carrier. They were joined by four soldiers, men Arthur's age with toned muscles and short haircuts. Like Bone the day before they were familiar, reminding him of past acquaintances even though the resemblance was only partial.<p>

"Who are they?" Arthur asked as one of them went in for a layup.

"How should I know?" Bone caught the rebound and tossed it to his teammate. "They're _your_ projections."

Arthur frowned, but the game was still going and he was too competitive not to put his focus in it. He hadn't played in years but the ball felt just right under his palm, rough and warm and ready to jump into the net. He shot from three point territory and missed.

When the game was over they sat on the edge of the ship, drinking beers with their feet dangling off the side. Arthur leaned forward, feeling the pull of the wind as it beckoned him toward the water surging below. "How come I'm a perfect shot with a gun I've never used but I can't make a game-winning three-pointer?"

"Because your mind decides what you're capable of in here," Bone replied. "You've played ball before. Your mind knows the physics involved, that it takes skill. The more practical knowledge you have about whatever you're doing, the more realistic the dream."

Arthur took a long gulp of his beer. "So if I pick up a real gun and shoot it, the next time I dream I'll be worse at it than I was before," he surmised.

"Backwards, huh." Bone finished his drink and tossed the bottle overboard. It disappeared beneath the surf. "You just can't trick your subconscious."

Arthur kept his eyes on the water, and when the bottle bobbed to the surface far off on the waves, he smiled and wasn't sure why. "I guess not."

When they woke up Bone reached under his bed and pulled out a heavy suitcase. He flipped it open and Arthur only just managed to keep his poker face at the sight of half a dozen guns of various sizes. "I thought you said you had no money," Arthur said.

"I didn't exactly pay for most of them." Bone lifted the SDM-R that they had used in their first dream together. "Go ahead-it's not loaded."

Arthur hesitated. When he took the gun his hands drooped, not expecting the weight. The metal was cool beneath his fingers, and it sent an unexpected chill up his arms. There was depth to the weapon he hadn't been able to sense in the dream, and when he traced the fingertip over the trigger it finally occurred to him that he was holding something lethal.

Bone watched him closely. "There's a range twenty miles up the road," he said.

An hour later Arthur was squeezing the trigger of a third generation Glock 17, shredding paper targets one tiny hole at a time. The kick traveled past his elbow and into his chest, where his heart beat an ever quickening rhythm. It wasn't as easy as it looked in the movies. He hadn't gone through his first magazine before his hand started to cramp. He shook it out and paid close attention as Bone showed him how to reload-that part was simple enough. But even after having fired seventeen rounds the eighteenth still rocked him, made his shoulder ache and quickened his breath.

"Why don't you get your hands dirty?" Bone asked, leaning against the side of the booth. "You're a decent shot for an amateur."

"It's not worth the trouble." Arthur took a deep breath, and on his next shot he tried not to blink with the report of the gun. He couldn't do it. "Why do you?"

"Because I have to."

_No you don't,_ Arthur wanted to say, but he didn't. He set the gun down on the shelf in front of him and took off his earmuffs. "I'm taking your offer," he said. "But I want to try the real thing before you leave town."

"Thought you might." Bone offered his hand. "It's a deal."

* * *

><p>That evening, Arthur put his feelers out. He sent a few carefully worded text messages to trusted sources and went out with a group of friends, catching up on the town gossip. Everyone was willing to share stories with Arthur: he was just clever enough to amuse without being a show-off; he made eye contact and listened with perfect attention when someone spoke to him; he never talked poorly of anyone to their face or behind their backs. Being handsome and classy helped, too. Everyone trusted a man who showed up in a perfectly fitting Gucci but let his cuffs and tie hang open by the end of the evening.<p>

"Because it's not really about money," he told Roger as they leaned against the balcony of their friend's uptown condo. "It's not even about connections-it's about making other people feel comfortable when they're around you. There are a million ways to do that with any given person. You find the right way in and they'll trust you even if they know they shouldn't."

"That something your old man the lawyer teach you?" Roger asked. He offered Arthur his beer.

"Yeah." Arthur didn't like the brand but he took a long sip anyway, silently proving his point. "He used to say, 'the best thing you can do for your client is have his suit tailored.'"

"Funny thing for a man in a tailored suit to say." Roger trailed two fingers down the back seam of Arthur's perfectly fitting jacket. "There's an implication in there."

Arthur smiled, tipping his head back just enough for it to be an invitation. "Yeah, I guess there is," he said. When Roger leaned into him he sighed, thinking it would be nice to get laid before tackling the first day of his internship come morning.

His gaze wandered over the city lights, and then higher, seeking out a narrow, crescent moon just clearing the skyline. Seeing it so pale and small made him feel sorry for it, and he turned to meet Roger for a kiss so that he wouldn't have to dwell on it anymore.

* * *

><p>"Can you have sex in a PASIV dream?" Arthur asked.<p>

"Fuck." Bone squirmed in his windbreaker as if allergic to it. "Come on, Arthur, I'm sure you can figure _that_ out on your own."

Arthur rolled his eyes. "It wasn't an invitation."

He glanced around their surroundings that evening, for the first time of his own creation: Bone had insisted he begin slow, and he had chosen Central Park. It probably wasn't the most accurate recreation, as it had been months since his last visit if not longer, but it was simple and organic and he felt he could use a little of both. When he closed his eyes the dream seemed to pulse around him, close to his skin and desperately obedient. He'd never felt anything like it.

"I was just thinking," Arthur went on, "there must be a lot of prostitutional applications for technology like this."

"If there are, they don't interest me," said Bone. "Don't need to beg for the real thing."

"Fair enough."

Arthur watched the projections mill past them. Some research on his own had provided him insight on the nature of the beings, but he felt he understood much better by simply watching. Bone's subconscious was full of men and women who were just as hard-lined as him, all of them hurried and anxious, none of them children. It gave the park a charged air that Arthur appreciated even as it set him on edge.

"I want to try somewhere else," Arthur said. "Is it true that if you change too much mid-dream, the projections become hostile?"

Bone plucked a cigarette out of his pack. "Try it and find out."

Ten minutes later they were sprinting through a fractured landscape of lush trees interrupted by sterile office buildings. Arthur would have liked to pause and appreciate the unintentional beauty in their juxtaposition, but during his earlier reflections he had neglected to notice that all of Bone's projections apparently carried assault rifles. Chunks of bark leapt into their path with every gunshot, and glass shattered on either side. Every few seconds Arthur felt a bullet pass dangerously close, to his arm or even his scalp, and he thought unwittingly of himself as a paper target, hanging precariously from a little metal clip.

Blood splattered to his left, and he glanced back just in time to see Bone crash to the asphalt in a shredded heap. Arthur's heart soared into his throat. _They're his projections-they're not supposed to- His_ fear became real and he fled, his limbs pumping urgently, his breath hard and almost excited. When he ducked off the path the projections lost him for a moment, and he thrilled with his escape, until he turned the corner of one of the office buildings and took a gut-full of hot lead.

They awoke in the motel, as always, and though Arthur's blood was still racing he found himself savoring the fiery euphoria. With his eyes still closed he breathed in and out, gradually winding down. Hearing Bone gasp quietly across from him in the otherwise silent, humid room lent an intimacy to the experience Arthur wasn't prepared for.

_We just died together._ He passed his hand over his face and up through his hair, smoothing it back. _Is this what death feels like?_

Someone else was in the room. Arthur tensed and his eyes flicked to the bed, where a man was reclining against the headboard. He was dressed in camo pants and a T-shirt stretched over his muscled chest, and rough stubble attempted to disguise his smooth jaw and full, almost feminine lips. He watched Bone and Arthur with patient curiosity as if he had been there all along.

Arthur stared; the intruder looked so easy in his environment that he had to wonder a moment if he was still dreaming. He looked to Bone. "What is he doing here?"

Bone pulled the needle from his arm. "Oh. You're back."

He swung his feet off the bed and came closer, and Arthur was still so confused by his being there that he failed to react until they were close together. Firm hands clasped Arthur's wrist and gently removed the IV. "Need some help with that?" he asked with a quirk of his lips.

Arthur jerked his arm to his chest; he felt exposed, as if the stranger had intruded on an intensely personal moment. "What is he doing here?" he asked of Bone again.

"This is Eames," Bone introduced. He handed off his needle, and Eames repacked the device. "My partner." He waved between them. "This is Arthur, our informant."

Eames glanced up sharply. "Informant?" he repeated. He gave a short bark of laughter. "You didn't think I could find it?"

"You're not local. This way's faster."

"Or did you think I'd try to keep it for myself?" Eames stole Bone's cigarette pack off the table and thumped down on the end of the bed. "I'm not as desperate as you, mate."

Bone looked away. Something anxious and shamed crept into his face, reminding Arthur of his hurried projections. Desperate was exactly the word for him. Though Arthur had come to the same conclusion early on, seeing Eames lay a man open so carelessly sent a prickle of ill ease along his spine, and in turn triggered an irrational flash of defensiveness.

"So where is it?" Arthur asked smartly. "Let's hear your leads."

Eames stopped with his lighter halfway to the cigarette in his lips. He looked Arthur up and down and then finished lighting it. "Let's hear _yours_. You're the one that's getting paid."

Arthur's eyebrow quirked, but then Bone cast him a warning look, and he decided not to share the conditions of their arrangement. "It's definitely still in the city," he said. "There are rumors everywhere but nothing definite yet."

Eames puffed lazily. "So in short, you have nothing."

"Did you think it was going to drop into your lap?" Arthur rolled his sleeves down and buttoned his cuffs. "I'm getting the feeling that neither of you really understand what you're dealing with. This is top secret military equipment, not a few grand or a fancy diamond."

"I told you, all you have to do is find it," said Bone. "Let us worry about the rest."

"If you say so." Arthur pulled his jacket on and caught Eames watching him closely with an expression he couldn't identify. "What?"

Eames leaned back on his hands. "Nothing."

"I'll let you know when I have something." He left, feeling Eames's eyes on his back all the way out.

* * *

><p>That night he dreamt Central Park was a warzone. The trees were bald and gnarled, the grass yellow, and lanky soldiers in gray fatigues crouched in every ditch and around every corner. Arthur sped through their ranks, a Glock clutched in his fist that he never fired. His only thought was escape, and when a glossy skyscraper rose out of the earth ahead of him he charged inside. He climbed stairways amidst pounding gunfire, dodged rifle stocks aimed at his head, and at last took cover behind an overturned desk in a conference room.<p>

He was catching his breath, at last working up the courage to return fire, when hard lights flared through the windows and a length of curved metal crushed into his back. He died instantly.

* * *

><p>Arthur had just finished repairing a minor coding error in his new employer's main server when his phone trilled with an incoming text message. After a quick glance around to be sure that no one of authority was watching, he checked it.<p>

_didnt__ no u dreamed_

As a precaution he didn't keep business numbers saved in his phone, so he had to wait until his lunch break to look up the sender: Wallace. When he remembered who that was the taste of his club sandwich took a turn for the worse. He texted back.

_Doesn't everyone?_

He was on his way back to the office when he received a reply.

_lets__ get coffee im thirsty_

Arthur clenched his jaw, and stood in the lobby for a long minute, staring down at his screen. He started to delete the message but stopped himself. He replied.

_I'm at work. I'll meet you at 5, same place as before._

A minute later he received an attached photograph of kittens spilling out of an oversized boot. With a shake of his head he went back to work.

At five Arthur took the subway downtown and picked the furthest booth at a McDonald's with just a coffee. After a sip he gave up trying to drink it. He was thinking about the inside of Bone's elbow when a young Indian woman with a shaved head slumped into the booth across from him: Wallace. In terms of deceiving pseudonyms hers was much better. "Hey," she greeted.

"Hey." Arthur had dressed down for the meeting, his jacket shoved in the corner, his tie loose and askew. Wallace had dressed up, in a striped sweater and black Jeggings. They looked just like a pair of college friends sharing coffee in a McDonald's. "You look good," he said, but what he really meant was, _Thanks for not coming in leather._

"You too." She slurped her mocha and then reached into her purse. "You said you have a headache?" She slid a small box of ibuprofen across the table.

"Thanks." Arthur gave the box a gentle shake and heard what was definitely not a plastic bottle jingle inside. "How much do I owe you?"

"Seven."

Arthur glanced up sharply. _Hundred?_ She smiled. "Seriously?" he asked.

Wallace grinned at him. "I knew you weren't into this," she said. "You're here to ask me where I got it, aren't you? Who are you working for?"

Arthur shook his head; she would have been a bright girl if only she wasn't a drug dealer. "They're not local. You know what I want, so how much is it going to cost me?"

"For an even G I'll give you the box and a name."

_I don't need the box._ Arthur glanced down at the box still in his open palm. He willed himself to say it. _I don't need the box, I just need the name._ "I'll need to find an ATM," he said.


	2. Chapter 2

Inception, its characters and settings, do not belong to me, and are being used here without permission and for no profit. This fic is rated NC-17 for graphic violence, sex, language, addiction, and non-con. Written for the Inception Reverse Bang with partner birddi.

**The Paradox Job**

Part 2

* * *

><p>When Arthur knocked it was Eames who answered. He frowned. "Where's Bone?"<p>

"Out." Eames took a step back. "Won't you come in?"

"Is he going to be back soon?"

"Should be," Eames said, pulling a cell out of his back pocket. He started texting as he headed into the room. "Did you eat? I'll tell him to bring extra."

Arthur closed the door behind him. "That's fine." He glanced around and noticed the second bed was rumpled, and a few extra pieces of luggage were strewn about. _So he's staying here._

"I didn't expect to see you again so soon," Eames said, tossing himself on the bed. "You have something for us?"

"It can wait until Bone's here," Arthur replied. He felt the bottle shift in his inside jacket pocket as he sat down.

Eames smirked at him. "You don't trust me?"

"Of course not," Arthur said immediately. "Besides, you're not my client-he is. So we wait."

"Sure, sure."

The room fell silent. Arthur let his gaze roam, trying to ignore the way Eames was looking at him, but it made him feel like he was in grade school. _There's always an in,_ he told himself. "So what's your stake in all this?" he asked, faking ease. He even managed to smile. "I hope for your sake Bone's paying you better than me."

Eames laughed. "It's not about pay," he said. "We need that PASIV so we can get to some real work."

Arthur raised an eyebrow. "Dare I ask what?"

Eames gave him a look, the kind that said, "Oh, you know," which wouldn't be annoying at all if Arthur was in on the joke. "Ever hear of extraction?" he asked.

"It's a fancy word for theft," said Arthur.

"Ever done it?"

"Of course." Arthur still couldn't entirely place the look Eames was fixing him with, and he wondered vaguely if a glance at his subconscious would provide a clue, the way Bone's nature was displayed so openly in his projections. "Only once or twice in the field, though."

Eames frowned thoughtfully, and it was then that Arthur realized they weren't talking about the same thing. Arthur had extracted documents, had hacked out security codes and account numbers, but Eames had to have been referring to something else.

"I heard there was a team out here," Eames continued. "You should introduce us."

"That's...not a good idea." Arthur glanced away and noticed Bone's denim sack peeking out from under the bed. "Do you want to dream with me?" he asked on impulse.

Eames frowned again, and he looked about to refuse, so Arthur added, "Just until Bone gets back."

"Are you asking to be the dreamer?" Eames asked with sudden caution. "Or the subject?"

"Whichever. Unless you think Bone would kill us for depleting his stash."

Eames snorted and dragged the device out from under the bed. "It's not _his_ stash," he said as he set the timer for them.

Arthur smiled to himself as he rolled up his sleeve. _He's just like all the rest,_ he told himself. _Everyone has buttons to push._ He watched to make sure Eames was using the needle Bone had set aside especially for him. "So which is it?"

Arthur held his hand out, but rather than simply give up the needle Eames leaned forward, clasping Arthur's wrist so he could insert it himself. His fingers were hot to the touch and rough, and Arthur couldn't help but flinch at the sting of being pierced.

"My dream," Eames said. "Your projections." Arthur was already thinking he had made a mistake by the time Eames engaged the device.

They awoke on a college campus. It wasn't one Arthur recognized, but there was no mistaking the crowded buildings and young men and women milling about them. The atmosphere was tense, not quite as anxious as Central Park the day before, but bright and urgent.

_Final's week,_ Arthur thought with a bemused smirk. "Interesting choice," he said.

"Thought I'd make you feel at home," Eames replied. He had changed to fit his environment, and was dressed in slacks and a thin jacket over his button down. His shoulders were wet as if it had been raining not long before, matching the real weather above. It was a strange addition of detail that somehow made everything feel a little sharper.

Arthur walked with him down one of the paths toward an old, brick building surrounded by apple trees. "This isn't my university," he said. "You don't even know where I go to school."

"Close enough though, isn't it?" Eames slicked his wet hair back. "And look at all these projections. I feel like I know you better already."

Arthur looked sharply at him. "Excuse me?"

"Isn't that why you invited me to dream with you?" Eames asked, and though his manner was light, Arthur was familiar enough with the game they were playing to know he was deadly serious. "You were hoping to sneak a peek at my mind, yeah? Nice try."

Heat seeped up the back of Arthur's neck, and all around his projections began to cast suspicious looks their way. "I was just trying to kill some time before Bone got back," he said. "No need to be paranoid."

"It's not about being paranoid." Eames pulled a pack of cigarettes out of his jacket. "I don't open my mind to extractors."

_What does that mean?_ Several projections altered their course and fell into step behind the two of them. "You don't have anything worth stealing," Arthur said.

"Do you?" Eames cast a significant look around them, noting the continuing agitation of the projections. He pressed a cigarette between his lips and dug into his pockets for a lighter. "Judging by your subconscious, you do."

Arthur took a look for himself, and it clicked. _He's talking about stealing from my mind_, he realized. Immediately he remembered the shame that had flickered through Bone's eyes, and the thought of being manipulated that easily by a man like Eames made him sick. He tried to face Eames down with calm detachment, but by then the projections were charging forward with murderous intent.

_I don't want him in my mind._ The sensation flooded through him, and when a brunette stormed up behind Eames and stabbed him in the throat with a compass he was satisfied. Eames dropped to the sidewalk, twitching and gushing blood, and a moment later the campus began to unravel around them.

"No one steals from me," Arthur grumbled as the clock tower tipped off its foundations and raced toward him.

He awoke to the sound of Eames's laughter. "Damn," Eames said, "you've got a nasty subconscious on you. I'm impressed."

Arthur pulled the needle out of his arm just as a key slotted into the front door. Bone fumbled his way inside with an armful of groceries in one hand and a bag that smelled like Chinese takeout in the other. He noticed right away that Eames was nudging the device back under the bed with his foot. "Were you under?" he asked sharply.

"Oh, yeah." Eames looked sheepish as he crouched down to put the device away properly. "I wanted a peek at what an informant's mind looks like."

Arthur frowned as he accepted the Chinese from Bone and set it out on the table. _I don't need you to watch my back,_ he wanted to say. "You mean, you wanted to try and extract from me?" he retorted as he opened up the paper cartons.

"Ah, can you blame me?"

Bone grumbled under his breath and set the groceries down between the beds. "Fine. Whatever. Let's eat."

"I came because I have information," Arthur said as they crowded around the motel's tiny table. "I talked to a drug dealer from the west side that got his hands on some Somnacin from one of his clients, a thief I've worked with before named Abida. He's helped coordinate some high class criminals that have been making their way up and down the east coast for the past few years. There's a good chance they're the ones that hit the General's mansion."

"So you know them?" Bone took a gulp of his beer. "Ask them who they sold it to."

Arthur was already shaking his head. "It's not that easy. They've already left town, and they're not the sort of people even someone like me can track down without drawing attention. But Abida is still around. He said he'd give up the client's name for ten grand."

Eames choked on his beef. "For a name? Bloke's a bit touched in the head, is he?"

"He's a junkie but he had a point," said Arthur. "His team got three million for that job. Like I said, high class."

"Then you either swipe ten large or torture him," Bone said succinctly. "No problem."

"Me?" Arthur leaned back. "Where am I going to get ten thousand dollars? This is _your_ job."

"Our deal was for you to get me the location. So get it."

"And I told you," Arthur insisted, "my hands don't get dirty."

Eames leaned forward. "Mine do," he offered.

Arthur looked to him and had to suppress a chill. Eames had scars on his knuckles, had a wicked gleam in his eye and had muscles hardened through more than dumbbells. It was easy to imagine the kind of damage a man like him could do.

"I'll try to get the name another way," Arthur found himself saying. "Or keep my ear open for a quick job. If that doesn't pan out...you can rough him up if you want, but-" he pointed emphatically "-nothing permanent. And my name never comes up."

"Ahh, like the way you work, Arthur. So professional."

When the food was gone Arthur started to leave, but stopped when he noticed Bone following him out. "What?"

Bone braced his hands in the open doorway as if shielding himself from Eames, who was flipping through television channels behind him. "Your dealer," he said. "He got a number?"

"He's not _my_ dealer," Arthur replied automatically. "He's good for getting information, that's all."

Bone shook his head. "Whatever, just...give me a number."

_Poor junkie bastard._ Arthur reached for his phone, and when his fingertips brushed the sharp edge of a small box in his pocket bile crept up the back of his throat. Hastily he accessed his call history and let Bone copy Wallace's number onto his palm.

* * *

><p>After work, Arthur went to the gym in the basement of his building. He had worked out regularly when he was still in high school, having been an athlete with fewer "hobbies" to distract him, but since then a good diet and the occasional run had been his only methods of remaining in shape. They served him well for the most part, but feeling the burn of the weights travel up his arm for the first time in years was like an awakening. Goosebumps rippled beneath his sweat and set his heart pumping. It wasn't anything like sprinting down a perfect beach but his body ached for the stimulus, and was granted it.<p>

The next day he was as sore as he had ever been. After an exhausting day of work he threw himself into bed with his laptop and did his best to research shared dreaming and Somnacin, but there was precious little to find. Dreamshare was a rumor passed between wealthy criminals and conspiracy theorists. There was nowhere left to look without declaring his own experience openly, but he knew better than to offer up so much of himself. Bone and Eames were the only sources of knowledge open to him.

He glanced at his bedside dresser and thought of the ibuprofen box inside.

That night, Arthur dreamt of the beach again. As before it tipped and retched under his feet, and the sand formed jagged ledges that bit into his ankles. The moon wheeled through the dark sky like a bobbing yo-yo and at one point melted into silver ooze on the horizon. All the world was chaos, indistinct at the edges, tumbling over and over.

Metal carved into his chest, spilling molten blood down his stomach and thighs. Screams hammered against his ears and he awoke, sweating and choking.

* * *

><p>"I've been having nightmares," Arthur said.<p>

He and Bone had left the motel in favor of an empty patch of dying earth on the other side of the highway. He wasn't in his usual slacks that afternoon, instead in sweats and a sleeveless undershirt. Bone had agreed to teach him some hand to hand combat, in exchange for adding the planning of the extraction to their deal.

Bone spat in the mud. "What kind of nightmares?"

"Strange ones. Like, surreal."

Bone came at him. He was tight and controlled and only extended as far as he needed to. He kept the pace slow and let Arthur work his way through a few combinations.

"You should ask Eames," said Bone during another break. "He knows more about that shit than I do."

"No." Arthur shook his head emphatically. "No, I'm not asking Eames. I just want to know if it's normal." He stretched his arms behind him. "It's like the more I use the compound, the more chaotic the dreams become."

"That's normal," Bone said. "If you use Somnacin for long enough, you'll eventually stop dreaming naturally all together."

Arthur frowned. "So it's like building up a tolerance."

"Yup."

After a few rounds they headed back toward the motel. "Did you tell me about your nightmare because you want to show it to me?" Bone asked casually.

Arthur had to consider that for a long moment, and by the time he was approaching an answer they'd reached Bone's room, where Eames was waiting for them on the step outside. "No," he said quickly. "But thanks."

* * *

><p>Arthur went to work. At his desk, the letters on his keyboard began to smear together, then the letters on the monitor. He dropped his chin in his hand and looked around the office, flicking his favorite red die back and forth across the desk just to hear it clatter. The air was fairly relaxed, men and women in casual business attire milling between the cubicles, and he thought, <em>If<em>_ they were projections what kind of person would they represent?_ He was tempted to overturn the water cool just to see if they might wake him up.

* * *

><p>Arthur went back to the motel. He had nothing to offer but he was certain that if he asked Bone to dream with him, he wouldn't say no. And he didn't. He dreamed for Arthur rusty battlefields and deep jungles, where the difference between life and death was razor thin and they rarely lived to the end of the clock. The violence hiding in Arthur's subconscious surprised him, but he couldn't say he was displeased with it.<p>

After suffering a nasty death at the hand of South American guerrillas Arthur stepped outside and took in a deep breath. There was moisture in the air but it was cool, making him feel clammy all over. He smoothed his hair back and was preparing to leave when he heard a window open behind him.

"Hey," Eames called.

Arthur turned back. Eames had his elbows braced to the sill and was watching him. If there had been any trace of teasing in his face Arthur would have simply left him there, but he looked serious. "What?"

Eames crooked a finger, and with a sigh Arthur came closer. "What?" he repeated.

"How goes the hunt?" Eames asked with faked disinterest.

Arthur glanced into the room and saw light peeking out from under the closed bathroom door. A moment later the shower started. "I said I would let you know if I had any leads."

"Maybe you shouldn't be hanging around here until you have something."

Arthur blinked, and then smiled-it was usually enough to put most people at ease, but Eames just continued to stare at him as if he had already seen straight through it. "Why not?" he asked. "You think I'm not doing my job?"

"How can you be if you're here?"

Arthur wasn't known for being particularly intuitive, but it wasn't difficult to judge the real source of Eames's concern. _There are a million ways,_ he told himself, and though he mourned for his slacks he sat himself down in front of the window so that Eames wouldn't have to strain to see him. "I know what you're really worried about," he said. "You think I'm just here to bleed your stash dry and run. Right?"

Eames's eyebrow quirked. "It occurred to me."

"It's not about that," Arthur assured him. "Look at what I'm wearing." He gave his jacket a tug. "You don't think I could afford my own compound if that was all I was after?" When Eames conceded the point with pursed lips, Arthur felt bold enough to play a bluff. "It's just...fun, dreaming with someone new." _With someone at all._

That caught Eames's interest. "Is your normal team not into dreaming for recreation?" he asked.

"Not exactly." Arthur leaned forward; he took a special kind of pride in being able to lie to a man like Eames. "And you have to admit, Bone has exciting dreams."

Eames frowned, and cast a quick glance back inside the room. "Actually, I wouldn't know," he said, quieter than a moment before.

_How can you be extractors together and not share dreams?_ Arthur thought, and was about to ask, but then he understood. "You don't open your mind to extractors."

"Benny and I are at an impasse," he said with a hint of a smirk. "He only ever wants to be the dreamer, but I refuse to be his subject. I'm surprised we put up with each other."

Arthur shook his head. "Why are you even working together if you don't trust him?"

"It's not just about trust," said Eames. He scoffed. "As a dreamer yourself, I figured you would understand."

Arthur glared at him to hide his spark of anxiety. "Enlighten me."

Eames leaned further out the window. "It's not just about trust," he repeated, as if he were sharing a secret that had been brewing for a long time. "It's not just dreams-you're letting someone into your mind, after all. In some ways, it's the closest you'll ever be to another person." He met Arthur's gaze seriously. "It changes you."

_It hasn't changed me_, Arthur thought immediately. He stared back at Eames with barely restrained defiance. _It's just dreams._ But something in him stirred, made curious by the implication of intimacy. "I guess I never thought of it that way."

Eames's eyelids drooped, and for a moment Arthur thought he detected something bitter and almost vulnerable there. Sitting across from each other in the dark like children Arthur at first wasn't sure what it meant, and by the time it came to him, a smirk was already erasing whatever sincerity had briefly inhabited Eames's expression.

Eames chuckled. "You still have a lot to learn about dreaming, then."

Arthur flushed, and with an irritated sigh he pushed to his feet. "Just because I disagree doesn't mean I don't get it," he replied.

Eames leaned back inside the window. "Good night, Arthur."

Arthur turned, ready to march off, but when he glanced back he thought he caught a glimpse of Eames's softer expression, and it made him pause. _It changes you_. "Eames," he called, doing his best to sound completely nonchalant. "I'll see you tomorrow."

* * *

><p>"I'm surprised you let me back in here," Eames said as he and Arthur circled each other. "Sure your mind's not about to stab me again?"<p>

"Stop trying to piss me off and you'll be fine," Arthur retorted. His fingers stretched and then curled into loose fists against the tape wrapping his knuckles. He attacked, throwing out a right jab that Eames had no trouble backing out of. His second shot was closer, but Eames was faster than he looked and it also missed.

Eames smirked as he sidled to his left. "Come to think of it, they look a little worse for wear. Your projections, I mean."

Arthur risked a glance at the older men and women surrounding their boxing ring-they did all appear somewhat haggard. "It's because I overworked myself at the gym earlier," he said. "I'm sore."

"Oh?" Eames looked intrigued. "I honestly couldn't tell."

He surged forward, and Arthur thought, _It's__ just a dream. I can be just as fast as him if I want to be_. A fist curved toward his head and he shoved his arm up, deflecting it away. He wasn't quite as fast as he needed to be, and Eames's thumb knuckle raked against his temple, but as the blow turned him his own fist found impact in Eames's shoulder.

They broke apart, Eames laughing as he rubbed the sting out. "Come on, I bet you're better than that," he taunted.

Arthur needed a moment to settle his balance, but he told himself again, _It's__ just a dream, my head doesn't actually hurt,_ and he charged. The two of them traded blows, gradually hitting harder, faster, until their limbs were a blur-and yet Arthur was still keeping pace. _It's a dream, I can do anything_, he thought, and when Eames's fist rushed forward again he caught it and twisted, flinging Eames over his shoulder.

Anyone else would have landed flat on their back, but Eames twisted in mid-air, faster than should have been humanly possible, and hit the mat on his feet. With barely any time taken to get his bearings he turned and hooked his arm in Arthur's, flinging him into the ropes.

Arthur gagged as the rope dug into his stomach and broke his concentration. By the time Eames was dragging him to the mat he forgot that he was dreaming, and whatever skill he had been displaying over their match leaked out of him. In seconds he was face down, his arm twisted painfully behind him, Eames's knee in his back.

"Okay, okay!" Arthur pounded the mat with his free hand. "Ease up, Jesus."

Eames let go of his arm and leaned back. "You're not bad, for someone who doesn't get his hands dirty," he complimented gruffly. "Gotta work on tricking your subconscious, though."

Arthur rolled onto his back and stretched his sore shoulder. "You can't trick your subconscious," he said.

"Sure you can." Eames slumped onto his hip. "You were doing it just now, weren't you? You've been in enough fights to know you can't throw me, but you overcame your natural instincts and did it anyway."

Arthur frowned up at him. The last time he had been in a real fight was in tenth grade, against a member of the baseball team that had been shit-talking him behind his back. He had fractured a bone in his hand and hadn't thrown a punch in the real world since. _Bone was right,_ he thought_. I'm only good at this because I still don't have enough real world experience to tell me otherwise._

"I guess so," he said.

"Let's do it again." Eames smacked him in the ribs and stood. "Come on, try to throw me for real this time."

He lowered his hand, and Arthur regarded it warily for a long moment before accepting. The fingers that curled around his were hard and sweaty, and when Eames pulled him up he felt their strength shudder down the length of his arm.

"You're in a much better mood than last night," Arthur observed.

"Don't worry about that," Eames said, waving his hand. "I was just feeling you out." He smiled wistfully. "It's too bad that there are so few dreamers like us, but we still have to be careful with each other, huh?"

Arthur's curiosity prickled. "Are there many more where you come from? Africa?"

"A few." Eames moved to the edge of the mat and retrieved a bottled water. "But like you said, it's fun to dream with someone new for the first time."

Arthur held up his hand, and after his drink Eames tossed the bottle to him. "So," he said, "I guess that means you were pretty excited to meet me, huh?"

When Eames smiled he looked like a different person. "You could say that."

They practiced a few more times. Arthur took deep breaths, willing himself to remember over and over that he was dreaming, that his mind was just as resolute as Eames's. He could do anything if he thought about it hard enough, even trick Eames into believing he was a skilled dreamer with years of experience.

They came together, heated skin scraping together in close quarters, breath rough. _I can beat him,_ Arthur thought, even as Eames got his arm around his neck. He struggled and dug his heels in, and was at last able to spin them both to the mat. The impact of Eames's shoulder to the floor loosened his grip and Arthur was able to twist around, shoving his forearm into Eames's throat.

Eames relaxed beneath him. His surrender was premature and unwarranted, as he was clearly strong enough to throw Arthur off with little effort, but he didn't try to fight. Instead, he laughed. "That's the spirit. I can see why Benny likes you."

"Likes me?" Arthur sat up on his knees, one on either side of Eames's waist.

"Yeah. You didn't think he shared his stash with just anyone, did you?"

"I didn't think about it." Arthur looked away, and noticed that his projections were suddenly crowding around the edge of the ring, watching with particular fascination. _What are they looking at?_

"He's a lot easier about letting people into his mind than I am," Eames continued. "But not usually when he's running low on compound. I bet he's thinking of asking you into our team."

Arthur drew his gaze quickly back. "Me?" He scoffed. "Team up with the two of you? To do what, extractions?"

"Sure." Eames smiled slowly, and he covered Arthur's knees with his hands. "We could use someone like you."

Arthur stared. He tried to be disgusted with the idea of being enlisted by a pair of thugs to steal from people's brains, but was distracted by the way Eames was looking at him, as if he were a freshly discovered prize. Arthur felt something unexpectedly inviting stir in his gut. His body was warm from the exercise, thrilled with its accomplishments even if the final victory had been willingly granted. The pulse fluttering through his veins felt more real than even outside the dream. Here, he had power. Here, he had felled a brute of a man who now lay between his legs, panting and submitting.

Eames's fingers flexed against his knees, and Arthur imagined those strong, sweaty hands creeping up his thighs. He pictured them digging into the soft flesh around his pelvis, pulling him into sturdy hips. He saw himself, his hands braced to a broad chest like a lion claiming its kill, his teeth bared, his back arching-

Two old men that had done nothing but watch the match until then climbed into the ring and beat them both to death with twenty pound dumbbells.

"Shit," Eames hissed as they awoke in the motel. "You could have just said no."

* * *

><p>Arthur emptied the magazine into his target. Not every shot was good but they all hit the paper, a marked improvement over the last time. He reloaded swiftly and with precision, and fired again. His first bullet hit the target in the head.<p>

"Good," Bone said next to him. "You've been practicing."

"When I get the chance," Arthur admitted. "In dreams and out." He fired another three shots and then glanced over his shoulder. "You were right-the first time I dreamed after you brought me here, I couldn't even shoot. But now I'm getting better."

"Good." Bone's eyes narrowed. "If you like the Glock so much, you can have mine."

Arthur frowned and adjusted his grip. "Why?"

"I don't need it."

He considered that over the next few shots. "Eames thinks I'm one of you," he said at last. "An extractor." He snorted. _I didn't even know what that was until he mentioned it._

"Do you want me to correct him?"

"No." Arthur shrugged stiffly. "Let him think whatever he wants. It doesn't change the job." He finished off the magazine and then set the gun down. "He offered me a spot on your team," he said, watching Bone closely to see his reaction.

Bone didn't twitch. "Yeah, he told me."

"And?"

"And what?" He flicked ash off the end of his cigarette. "No use planning future jobs when you haven't finished this one yet."

Arthur made a face as he pulled off his earmuffs. "I'm still working on it."

"Then we'll talk about it when the job's over."

As they left the range Arthur couldn't help but remember what Eames had said in the ring. "Why are you still letting me use your compound?" he asked bluntly, knowing it was the approach Bone appreciated most. "I've got the hang of it by now. Showing me how it worked was the extent of our deal, wasn't it?"

Bone leaned against the passenger door as Arthur fished his keys out. That same vaguely ashamed look made its way into his face. "I get sick of killing my own projections," he said.

Back at the motel, they went under. Bone dreamed them up a few blocks of city streets ravaged by warfare, complete with martial law soldiers and tanks. It was only the two of them against an army, taking cover in the hollowed shells of store fronts, behind burning cars. _I'm dreaming,_ Arthur told himself, and when he slid out from behind the raised edge of a broken sidewalk slab, every shot from his rifle hit at least something. He ducked back, and when there was another break in the volley, he shot again and did better.

Bone threw a grenade into the enemy line. He was breathing hard and fast, sweat in his whiskers, his lips curled in a snarl that was almost a grin. Arthur knew how he felt, with the adrenaline pumping hard through his veins, exciting him to focus unknown in the waking world. Here, he was powerful. When he rolled out of cover all he had to do was aim and pull, and he could win wars. As a two man team they fought their way up the demolished streets. Dust and gunpowder stung Arthur's eyes to watering but he pushed forward anyway. His hand ached against his gun and his heart sang in his ears, brilliant and gritty and much more real than delivering memos to the office's section chief.

He killed men. He was finally close enough to see the blood spurt from their open wounds-could smell and even taste it. Splinters of bone pierced flesh, explosions rocked the foundations of buildings. Everything burned and blistered and popped in gory display. Unlike the many new experiences Arthur had gained over the past several days there was a gruesome familiarity in the snapping of bodies beneath crumbling debris. It made his heart race until he thought it might beat out of him.

When he woke up he looked at Bone, who still had his eyes closed, savoring the lingering euphoria of the dream. Half of him wanted to punch Bone's face bloody; the other was already eager to go under again.

Eames touched his arm and reached for the IV. His fingers were always warm, always firm, and when he drew the needle out their gazes locked. Arthur had grown accustomed to having him there, though he couldn't shake the feeling that there was something voyeuristic in his attention. The gleam in his eyes made him look as if he was just waiting for the opportunity to slip into Arthur's mind again in hopes of being impressed.

_Not yet_, Arthur thought. _I'm not ready for you yet._

* * *

><p>That night Arthur dreamt he was driving down a crowded highway at night. Headlights stabbed at him from every angle, and horns blared unceasingly. Sweat rolled down his neck and oozed between his foot and the pedal as he smashed it to the floor. As he rocked and swerved down the winding black the engine began to howl as if in agony, and other cars dove into his path in mad attempts to silence it. Arthur jerked the wheel back and forth, gasping for breath, never letting up until Hell pounded into the driver's side door and snapped his bones into splinters.<p>

He woke up sweating and didn't sleep the rest of the night.

* * *

><p>After a long day of staring at computer screens Arthur joined a small group of friends for drinks at a hole-in-the-wall bar. There were plenty of accusations of him working too hard, missing too many outings, and he was careful to keep his sleeves rolled down.<p>

"Olivia's parents are hosting their annual 'block party' next week," Roger told him as they slouched together in a corner booth. "You're coming, I assume."

"Don't I always?" Arthur sipped from his drink, and almost choked on it when he saw Eames enter the bar. Heat immediately spread up his neck and he looked away, hoping that without eye contact he wouldn't be noticed. "I already have an outfit picked out."

Roger laughed. "I bet you do."

The women next to them began to whisper, and Arthur couldn't help but look up again. Eames was heading straight for them with a little smirk that Arthur would have liked to slap off his face. _Maybe this is another nightmare_, he thought as two worlds collided. _I'll wake up any minute now._

"Fancy seeing you here," Eames greeted, hands in his pockets as he looked over the four of them. "Hard at work, I see."

Milla and Karisha exchanged grins, and together shot Arthur easily-interpreted looks. Figuring he had no choice if he didn't want things to become strained, he leaned forward. "Always," he said with a smile. "Everyone, this is a work friend of mine, Mr.-"

"Burke," Eames interrupted, extending his hand to each of them in turn. "Sorry to bother you, but I'm new in town and I couldn't help but gravitate toward a familiar face."

"Then you should join us," said Karisha. "And we'll all be familiar faces."

"I'd be delighted." Eames sat down with them, and when he smiled everyone at the table-save Arthur-couldn't help but smile with him. He had long perfected the same skill that Arthur had taken years to craft: charm. Effortless, universal charm. He chatted up Arthur's friends with his smooth accent as well as Arthur himself ever could-even Roger seemed to find his shallow lies intriguing. Arthur played along like a pro but he knew his ears were still red and he kept inventing and then not using excuses to leave.

When he couldn't take any more he announced that he was buying the table a round, and made his way to the bar. Eames, being the perfect gentleman he was, volunteered to help carry. As soon as they were out of earshot of the booth Arthur looked to Eames with a winning smile. "What the hell are you doing here?"

"Checking up on you," Eames admitted. When they reached the bar he leaned his elbows against it, giving off every appearance of casual ease. "It's taking too long."

Arthur pursed his lips tight. "Bone hasn't complained. Why should you?"

Eames pulled a cigarette box out of his jacket. "There should be a hundred ways to make ten large in this town," he said. "Or else..." He lifted an eyebrow.

Arthur waited until Eames had his lighter out before saying, "This is a no-smoking bar."

Eames paused, and with a frown he put the lighter away. He left the cigarette between his lips, but as soon as the bartender noticed them and came over, he also reminded him, "Hey, this is a no-smoking bar."

"I'm not smoking it," Eames said with irritation Arthur took a bit too much enjoyment from. "Gimme five beers."

"We already had this conversation," said Arthur as the bartender ducked to collect the bottles. "I'm not taking advantage; these things just take time."

Eames watched him carefully, his eyes sharp and searching. Arthur remained very still beneath his scrutiny, feeling as if Eames were trying to spy directly on his projections. "You're a good guy," he said at last, just as five bottles clanged on the bar between them. "I like you."

Arthur straightened. "Put it on my tab," he told the bartender absently, and once the man had moved away he put his full focus back on Eames. Something bubbled in his stomach. "But?"

"But you've been going under a lot," Eames continued. "It worries me-especially because it's Bone. I may not go into his dreams but I know what he's like."

Arthur's pulse stuttered. "I don't need you to look after me," he said, even as an uncharacteristic sensation of panic gnawed his brain. On impulse he added, "I've been doing this long enough-I know my limits."

He started to turn away sharply, but then Eames's fingers snaked around his elbow. When they dug into the sore spot on his inner arm he jumped, as if afraid that he was being given away somehow, and he swiftly jerked free. The bar quieted as several people turned to look at them, and Arthur blinked, suddenly disoriented.

_Are they real?_ They were frowning at him and Eames with curious alarm, just like a flock of wary projections. Immediately Arthur retraced his steps, trying to remember how he had gotten to the bar, what he had done at work that day-

"I'm just asking you to be careful," Eames said. He touched Arthur's shoulder, gently urging him to calm. The rest of the bar went back to their drinks. "I've seen what this stuff can do to someone."

Arthur looked to the hand on his shoulder. It was warm and firm and he wanted to snap it in two. "I can stop," he murmured. "Anytime I want to." He stared Eames defiantly. "I just don't want to."

Eames tongued the cigarette still drooping from his lips. "I suppose you don't dream without it anymore, huh?"

Nightmares welled in the back of his throat, all hot metal and crushing blood. "And what about you?" Arthur challenged. "I've seen the way you watch us-you'd be right there with us if the machine allowed it." He quirked his lip. "You're just jealous he'd rather use it up with me than you."

Eames leaned back, and for a moment Arthur thought he had hit a perfect bulls-eye, but then he smiled, slow and knowing. "Sure."

Arthur smiled, too, and didn't mean it. He was squirming in his skin by the time they returned to the table with the beers, and his phone rang. He nestled into Roger's side as he answered, childishly hoping that Eames might give him a look for it, disappointed when he only continued to smile and chat the girls up.

"Hello," he said into the phone.

"Just wanted to say thanks," said Wallace. "Pimp."

Arthur hated being caught off guard. He went still, and Roger noticed, glancing at him sideways. "What is that supposed to mean?" he asked.

"I usually make it a rule not to fuck junkies, but sometimes, there are exceptions."

Arthur scowled and wiped his mouth. "Please tell me you didn't," he said.

She sounded as if she were glowing. "I'll see you at Olivia's next week. Maybe we can do business again."

Arthur almost hung up right then, but then he frowned. "You're going to Olivia's?"

"Of course." She laughed. "I love supporting my clients," she said coyly, and then she hung up.

Arthur shoved his phone into his pocket, his brow deeply creased. Roger nudged him with his shoulder and asked, "You okay?"

Arthur glanced across the booth to Eames, who was watching him with a cocked eyebrow. He didn't break eye contact as he turned his lips to Roger's ear and said, "Let's go to your place."

* * *

><p>That night, Arthur dreamt he was running madly through the streets. At first he thought he was being chased, but then he caught a glimpse of a figure ahead, and adrenaline surged through him. He pushed himself to his limits, dodging the late night clubbers and drunks, through dark alleys and side streets. The wind was in his face, cold and almost tearing, but he never slowed-couldn't bring himself to give up on his quarry. He was going to win.<p>

He caught up to him outside of a movie theatre, with an old-fashioned angled overhang bearing a hundred yellow lights, and clawed into the man's shoulder, dragging him to a rough landing on the sidewalk. His elbows scraped but still he was determined, his blood on fire as they grappled on the damp concrete. All around men and women flocked past, watching the spectacle as if they were fighting dogs no one dared to interrupt.

Arthur pushed the man onto his stomach. Fabric ripped beneath his desperate hands, and then he was digging into hot, yielding flesh. The body squirming beneath him was strong but he was stronger; he pinned him, scraping them together, hissing and biting at the back of his neck. His voice rumbled out of him as a feral moan and he shoved into him, not just with his hips but his entire body, until his partner gave way beneath him, sweating and writhing and begging for him-until he was tearing the man apart from the inside in a frenzy of straining limbs and pulsing blood.

Arthur awoke on his back, twisted in sheets already warm and musky. His heart was still fast and heavy in the pit of his stomach, but even stronger was the arousal throbbing through his groin. A thin, frustrated murmur escaped him as the dream began to dissipate, leaving him unsatisfied. Before the sensations of conquest and hunger could fade completely he shoved his hand down the front of his boxers and immediately began to jerk himself off in swift strokes.

It had been Eames-he knew the moment he touched himself, and his hand felt too thin, too wiry, that it had been Eames shaking between him and the sidewalk. He groaned again and tried to draw the memory of the dream back, to remember the thrill of triumph when Eames shuddered around him; it sent heat pounding through him unlike anything he had felt before. His skin seethed with perspiration and his hips leapt off the mattress, shoving his cock into his clammy palm in desperate need for release.

Someone rolled into him with lazy kisses to his throat. It wasn't who he wanted but the lips sent extra sparks into his veins, and he immediately grabbed the back of the man's neck and drew him in. They kissed, interrupted by Arthur's breath as he panted and groaned. Strong fingers roamed over his chest and stomach, worshiping and encouraging but staying out of the way of his pumping fist as if to say, _Do__ it, it's okay, do it._

Arthur arched his back and came, wringing out every drop as he cried in ragged ecstasy. He was shaking and gasping, and his limbs burned as if his chase through the city had been real-all of it had been real, and he thought, _Fuck you, you smug asshole, I don't need you looking after me, I'm not a fucking junkie, I'm in control and I'm better than you, you fucking-_

"Fuck," Roger laughed, his breath too hot against Arthur's ear. "That must have been some dream."

Arthur stared up at the ceiling, still trying to get his breath under control when reality slapped him across the face. His throat convulsed around a knot of disgust, and without a word he dragged himself out of the bed and retreated to the bathroom. He wanted to vomit.


	3. Chapter 3

Inception, its characters and settings, do not belong to me, and are being used here without permission and for no profit. This fic is rated NC-17 for graphic violence, sex, language, addiction, and non-con. Written for the Inception Reverse Bang with partner birddi.

**The Paradox Job**

Part 3

* * *

><p>Arthur called Olivia. He had seen her only a handful of times since the infamous Platt "Block Party" a year before, but he didn't have to offer any explanation to get her to go out with him. They went to a club on the west side that was darker than the places he usually visited, filled with a seedier crowd. Olivia didn't complain, and after a few drinks she was lit up and the most honest she was capable of being.<p>

"I'll be there at the party next week," Arthur said as they stumbled out of the club at closing, his arm around her waist. "Wallace said she'd be there, too."

Olivia all but cackled against his neck. "So you _do_ know Wallace? You know, I heard a rumor that you fucked her for a gram of coke."

"Well." He laughed to keep from scowling. "It wasn't coke."

Olivia continued to laugh, and as much as he hated the thought of such a rumor circulating at all, she abruptly tossed him a bone. "Then maybe I'll look for you at the party. Show you something special."

"Special?" he prompted. "It'll have to be a little more than 'special' to get my attention."

"You'll love it," said Olivia, rocking into him. "You love anything that's new. And _this_ is new. One of a kind. You won't find anything like it out here."

Arthur frowned, recalling who Olivia's wealthy mother was, who lived in her building, what connections they had and if any of them were military. "Then I'm looking forward to it."

Olivia shrugged her purse off her arm and began to paw through it. "Are you bringing a boyfriend?"

"I don't have a boyfriend. Roger's just a friend."

"Whatever." She at last fished out her phone. "Just let me know if you're going to show up with a party, so that I can order-"

She jolted and stumbled, almost dragging him down, and it wasn't until a man raced ahead of them that Arthur realized what had happened. "Fuck!" Olivia shouted, and she heaved one of her red pumps at the fleeing figure. "My fucking purse!"

"Hey!" Instinctually, Arthur ran after. Olivia's purse was white and easy to spot tucked under the thief's arm as he wove through the nighttime crowd. It reminded Arthur too much of his dream at Roger's, and he sped up, wanting to end the chase as quickly as possible. He was already gaining. At first he thought that the thief was merely slow but then he realized it was him-he was simply that fast.

"Son of a-" Arthur pushed harder, and could almost reach out and grab the asshole when steely fingers hooked around his arm. All his momentum worked against him and he was spun, skidding into an alley. Before he could stop himself he smashed face first into a cold brick wall. The stone grated his cheek, forehead, and chin, and blood began to seep almost immediately from his nose.

A man crushed into him from behind. Arthur struggled, but with his chest already to the wall and a forearm digging into the back of his neck he had no leverage and nowhere to go. He went still. _God damn it,_ he thought. _I can't believe I just fell for that._

"Fucker's fast," someone panted behind him.

"My wallet's in my left pocket," Arthur said. "Cash and cards. Go ahead."

A hand shoved into his pocket and wrestled the wallet out. He could hear it being flipped through and then the thief grunted. "Aren't you Arthur?"

_Fuck._ Arthur clenched his fists against the wall. "Who's asking?"

Jagged fingernails bit into his scalp, pushing him harder against the brick. "You've been poking around," the thief said. "And you're going to tell me what you've learned."

"I don't know what you're-"

The man detaining him reeled back, and Arthur struggled, but then a knee slammed into his lower back. He yelped as he was scraped into hard brick again. "You know where that PASIV is and you're going to tell me," the thief said.

Arthur closed his eyes. There were at least three of them, and though he hadn't heard the clink of a gun or seen a knife, he knew they had to be armed. _They won't kill me, it's not worth it to kill me,_ he told himself, and the thought kept him calm. "I don't know where it is yet," he said. "I haven't had enough time."

"Don't you try and-"

"If I knew where it was I would have extracted it already," Arthur snapped.

The thief grunted again. "Then you're going to tell me everything you know, starting with who you're working for."

He heard the unmistakable flick of a switchblade, and when he opened his eyes dull metal was moving slowly closer to his face. He renewed his struggles but the man holding him wouldn't budge, and true fear threatened to dissolve what remained of his self-control.

"Fuck!" a woman's voice shrilled from the alley mouth. "I'm calling the fucking cops!"

The pressure at Arthur's back eased, only a fraction, but it was enough for him to throw his elbow back in a desperate attempt. The hit connected but not enough to do anything but make his captor angry. Growling, the man stepped away and heaved him back by the collar of his shirt. His heels dragged and then his back struck the opposite wall with another jarring impact.

A fist rushed toward him. Arthur saw it as if in slow motion, and he thought of Bone in the field across from the motel. He thought of Eames in the old gym with that God damned smirk. And then he thought, _I can do anything__._

Arthur threw his arm up, parrying the rushing fist. He wasn't fast enough and a rough knuckle scraped his temple, but hearing the man cry out when his hand struck brick made it worth it. He swung his other arm with all his strength and grimaced when the impact of fist-to-temple spread up to his shoulder. But it was enough that time, and the man stumbled back.

Another man rushed at him, all brown leather and bad hair, and Arthur took a knee to the gut that knocked the wind out of him. It didn't stop him. He thought of Eames again, and he wrapped both arms around his attacker's thigh, twisting him off his feet.

The alley smeared. Blood was in Arthur's mouth and the taste of it confused his senses. He thought there had been three men but when he looked again he counted four. His limbs moved without him. He pushed away from the wall and kicked at the man he had just felled, jabbing his heel into his ear, his throat, until a punch to the jaw threw him back. It didn't stop him. _I'm faster than them,_ he thought, and he made it true; when the knife came at him he threw himself out of the way and then grabbed his attacker's wrist, turning and twisting, heaving him to the alley floor.

Arthur fought, and even when an arm wrapped around his neck he knew he wasn't in danger-if he lost all he'd have to do was wake up. That security gave him the strength he needed, and he lashed out, kicking off the wall with both feet. They scrambled and growled in the narrow space and then Arthur slipped free, attacked with his fists and elbows, until he was on the ground with a man beneath him.

_I can do anything,_ Arthur thought as he pummeled the man unconscious. _I am in control._

Olivia was screaming at him. She yanked at his jacket, and he realized suddenly that he was out of breath, his chest heaving with the effort of every intake. He was aching and bleeding and dizzy. With her help he stood, and caught only a glimpse of wary figures in the dark as they clamored out of the alley and ran.

They stopped in front of a brightly lit twenty-four hour drug store. "Fuck," Olivia hissed, over and over, as she helped Arthur lean back against the storefront window. "Fuck, Jesus, are you all right?" She touched his cheek and flinched back when he grimaced. "Sorry-sorry. I dropped my God damned phone before I could call the police."

Arthur groaned and scrubbed his sleeve over his face. "Don't bother. I didn't get a good look at any of them."

"What, are you serious?" She looked up and down the street in paranoia. "We were just mugged-we have to call the cops!"

"They weren't muggers," Arthur snapped. His head was pounding and breath was still hard to come by, keeping him from calming down. "Calling the cops is a waste of time. Just go inside and ask them to call us a cab."

Olivia shifted back and forth. "This is insane," she muttered.

"Just go already!"

"Fine! Fuck!"

She stormed into the drugstore. As soon as she was facing the counter Arthur pushed away from the window and ran. He was only a block away from the parking garage, and the few people left on the streets parted for him in his red, disheveled state. He may have been causing Olivia unnecessary panic but his mind was focused on only one goal.

His fist ached as he pounded on the door to Bone's motel room. His adrenaline was finally thinning out, and without it fueling him his hands began to shake. The realization of what had happened-what had _almost_ happened-churned in his stomach until he thought he might be sick. But when the door opened, when it was Eames that stared back at him still half-asleep and shirtless, his control snapped back into place through pure necessity.

Eames woke up quickly enough. "Jesus, what happened to you?"

Arthur pushed past him. "Where's Bone? You have to change motels-I don't know if I've been followed."

"Hey-slow down." Eames leaned outside for a quick look and then closed the door. "What happened?"

"I was jumped by four assholes," Arthur said as he stripped out of his jacket. "They knew that I'm looking for the PASIV-I told you someone else would be after it. They weren't that tough but-"

"Hey." Eames took him by the shoulders and forced him to sit down on the edge of the bed. "Just calm down for a second. Are you all right?"

Arthur blinked up at him, and frowned at the intense look of concern Eames fixed him with. When he caught a glance of his own reflection in the motel's dusty mirror he started at his own gruesome appearance: his face was a raw mess and the blood from his nose had caked around his mouth and stained his shirt. He barely recognized himself.

"I'm all right," he said, because that was what he wanted Eames to hear. "It's not all mine."

"Let's get you cleaned up."

Eames headed into the bathroom. As he let the water warm up Arthur glanced down to his hands. They were just as ragged as his face, with scraped knuckles and blood drying under his fingernails. As he watched his fingers curl he thought, _What__ did I do?_ He tried to remember the fight, but everything blurred together leaving him only with the sensations of bodies struggling together, of his arms and legs moving ahead of his conscious will. He had chased a man through the streets and then taken him to the ground and beat the teeth out of him. He had torn him apart and reveled in it.

_No, that was the dream._ He trembled, and his breath caught. _That part didn't happen._

Eames returned with a dampened washcloth. "Hold still," he said, and Arthur did so; he even kept his hands from shaking so that Eames wouldn't notice. But when Eames touched the back of his neck with steady and tender fingers, his resolve wavered.

"I wish I could have seen it," Eames said. He smoothed Arthur's hair back and then moved the cloth over his face, carefully wiping the blood away. The pull of cheap terrycloth against Arthur's brick-grated skin was painful but he didn't flinch. "You said there were four of them? You got off easy."

_You would have done better,_ Arthur thought, watching Eames's inked biceps. He closed his eyes as Eames rubbed the blood out of his eyebrows. "I'm fine," he mumbled, trying to force himself to believe it, but he knew the shudder was just beneath his skin. If Eames had been his usual, overbearing self, he would have been able keep up the front; but the hand on the back of his neck was gentle, and when Arthur winced Eames kneaded his thumb gently against him, soothing. He wasn't prepared for that. Everything was breaking down.

_I'm not one of you,_ he wanted to say. The washcloth smoothed down his cheeks, warm and comforting. _I'm not an extractor. This was my first fight in years and I shouldn't have been able to do that._ Eames folded the cloth over and cleaned the slopes of his nose-it made his eyes sting. _But I did. Could I have killed that man if Olivia hadn't pulled me away? Taken him apart just like in the dream?_

Warm, wet pressure slid over his mouth, and he parted his lips, tasting the bloody cloth against the tip of his tongue. His pulse began to race again and his hands tensed against his thighs. Eames was leaning over him, so close that he could feel the heat coming off his half-naked body, and he thought, _Could I take even you?_ He simmered with the thought of making that dream reality. _I can do anything. _Even though he was slouched beneath Eames's much stronger frame, his every joint strained as if on the verge of collapse, he wondered, and fantasized, and coveted.

Eames leaned back. Arthur flicked his eyes open and stared up at him, shaken but intense. Eames was watching him with heavy-lidded contemplation, and without thinking Arthur said, "Do it."

Eames stared at him. "What?"

Arthur lifted his hands. Eames leaned forward, thinking that he needed help in standing, but as soon as they were close he laced his fingers behind Eames's neck and pulled. Their mouths crashed together inelegantly, Arthur's kiss as clumsy as it was fierce. His lips stung but he only pressed them more fervently to Eames's mouth, coaxing it open, encouraging him with his tongue.

Eames grunted and tried to pull back. "Arthur-" His breath hissed between them but he couldn't retreat with Arthur's hands still tight behind his neck. He took Arthur by the shoulders. "The hell are you-"

Arthur threw his weight back, and with another grunt of surprise Eames came with him. The mattress against his back made him squirm but it was the heated pressure of Eames's body that drew a low moan out of his throat. When Arthur snapped his thighs around his waist, Eames finally seemed to get the picture, and though his eyelids fluttered with disbelief he ground down into Arthur's hips.

_Yes._ Arthur bucked against him. _God, yes._He felt like a rabid animal, rubbing up against Eames's bare skin, unable to think. Their kisses tasted like blood. When Eames groaned the reverberation spread all the way down to his cock, and he growled in reply, writhing beneath him. _You should have seen it, you son of a bitch. I was amazing._

The door opened. Arthur only barely noticed and didn't stop, until Bone was shouting at them, tearing them apart. Eames yelped as he was heaved onto the floor. As soon as he was gone Arthur started as if waking from a trance, and he blinked up at Bone with half-panicked confusion.

"Jesus!" Bone looked him over, and with a snarl of disgust he turned on Eames again. "You sick fuck, what did you do to him?"

"Wait," Eames said quickly, using the wall to pull himself up. "I didn't-"

The sound of a punch connecting jolted Arthur upright, and he was just in time to see Eames stumble into the television cabinet, holding his jaw. His throat constricted; when he couldn't get the words out fast enough he pounced on Bone's reeling arm. "Stop," he wheezed, and to his relief, Bone did. "Stop, it wasn't him."

Bone turned and tried to ease Arthur into a chair. "What the fuck is going on here?"

As soon as he was sitting Arthur became restless, and he stood up again. A few sharp breaths helped to clear his head, but his heart was still pounding and the feeling of nausea was quickly returning as well. "I came here to warn you," he forced out. "Someone's on to us-you have to switch motels. But I have a new lead and I think we're getting close."

Bone made a face, but he took Arthur seriously and immediately began to move around the room, throwing things into his duffle. "Who roughed you up? That Abida guy?"

"No." Arthur glanced to Eames, who was still leaning against the cabinet, working his sore jaw. He looked away again before their eyes could meet. "But he could have sold me out. Four men were waiting to jump me outside a club."

"Then it's not safe for you, either. You should come with us."

"No," Arthur said immediately. He heard Eames move away from the wall and begin to pack. "I'm fine."

His phone rang, and he had to retrieve his discarded jacket to dig it out and check the number. His stomach dropped. "Just call me when you find a new motel," he said as he moved toward the door. "I'll fill you in on my lead then."

"Will you be all right alone?" Bone asked after him.

"I'm fine," Arthur snapped. "I can handle myself-you two just worry about each other."

He reached the door, but as he opened it he couldn't help but glance back. Eames was watching him, baffled. It made Arthur sick again.

By the time Arthur was outside, his phone had stopped ringing. He stared at the screen, at the caller "Dad" flashing back at him, and then shoved the phone back in his pocket. "He can wait," he muttered as he yanked his keys out and let himself into his car.

His drive back into the city was a blur. He autopiloted into his complex's parking garage and moved swiftly through the lobby. It wasn't until he heard a gasp from the security attendant that he remembered what he looked like, even after Eames's bare cleanup.

"My God!"

Arthur froze. A man was hurrying toward him, in wire frames and a long overcoat. The sight of him put fresh panic in his already stress-weary arteries, and he couldn't move or speak, even as firm hands took his shoulders.

"Jesus, look at you. Are you all right? I'm taking you to the hospital."

Arthur shook himself, and felt a flash of relief that his earlier arousal had dissipated. "Dad..." When his father tried to turn him toward the exit he resisted, tugging the hands off him. "I don't need to go to the hospital," he said. "I'm fine." It sounded less convincing every time. "What are you doing here?"

"I got a call from Mrs. Platt," his father said. He prodded Arthur's head back and forth, checking his injuries. "She said Olivia called her in a panic, told her some story about you being mugged. Did you call the police yet?"

_Damn Olivia._ Arthur winced when his father touched his forehead and urged his hands off again. "It wasn't a mugging," he said.

His father leaned back, and he glanced sharply around the lobby. He sighed. "Let's talk upstairs."

"I'm sorry if I scared everyone," Arthur said as he let his father into his apartment on the fourth floor. He tossed his bloodied jacket immediately into a waste can and unbuttoned his cuffs. "But it was safer for Olivia that I go. I'll call her and apologize."

His father followed him further inside, shaking his head. "You've gotten yourself in trouble again."

"I'm fine." Arthur threw his shirt out in a different waste can and headed into his room. When he pulled a T-shirt out of his dresser he realized that his hands had started shaking again, and he grimaced. "It's nothing I need you for, don't worry."

His father leaned against the open doorway. "If it was, that would be a first, I suppose. But I've never seen you like _this_."

"It's not a big deal." Arthur grabbed a pair of shorts and ducked into the bathroom to change into them. He caught a glance of his face in the mirror and started all over again; Eames had cleaned off the worst of the blood but he was still scraped and bruised, and his knuckles were just as raw. He worked his fingers and found them sore. Bit by bit, the reality of the alley crept into him.

_What did I do?_ He shuddered and turned on the sink. _How was I able to do that? Why did I..._ He splashed his face with the cold water and hissed as it stung his red skin.

"Are you all right?"

Arthur toweled his face-carefully-and came out of the bathroom. "Yeah. Listen, it's really not as bad as it looks. The police won't find these guys, so there's no use calling in any favors with-"

"What is _that_?"

Arthur flinched, but wasn't sure what his father meant until steely fingers wrapped around his elbow and held his arm up to the bathroom light, making visible the healing bruise of a needle puncture.

"What the hell is this?" his father demanded.

Arthur's heart skipped, but he had practiced-he had recited the excuse so many times that it came out of him automatically, calm and perfectly believable. "I went to the clinic to get tested."

His father eyed him, but he had never caught Arthur in a lie, not in twenty-three years. He let go. "No reason to worry, I hope," he said.

"Of course not. I'm always careful."

Arthur led them out of the bedroom. "I'm sorry about this, really," he said. "But I'm all right. I'll just call in a sick day tomorrow, rest up, and deal with it."

"Son." His father followed, but when he caught on that Arthur was leading him out, he touched his shoulder. "Please tell me you're not mixed up in something dangerous."

When Arthur met his gaze, he almost caved-almost. Instead, he smiled. "You know me."

"That's what worries me," he replied, but he smiled, too. He shifted on his feet awkwardly and then gave Arthur a pat on the back. "Just promise that you'll tell me, if you find yourself in over your head. You know I hate that you-"

"Dad," Arthur interrupted. "It's fine." He nudged the hand off him and opened the door. "I'm going to get some sleep now."

"Right. Okay." With a deep breath his father headed out. "I'm glad you're all right. And I'm going to call tomorrow, to see how you're doing."

"Thanks, Dad. Good night."

"Good night."

Arthur closed the door, and everything went quiet. He stared at his apartment as if it were an alien landscape-suddenly, nothing was familiar. As he wandered into his bedroom his limbs became heavier and heavier, until his knees gave out just at the right time to deposit him onto the edge of the mattress.

His hands were raw and throbbing. He could still taste Eames mixed with the blood clinging to the corners of his mouth. His back, and his shoulders, and his stomach, and his jaw ached. The inside of his elbow was red and puckered.

He was a stranger in his own skin. Shame made his throat burn and he thought, _What's__ happening to me? _He pushed his thumb into the PASIV scar forming over his veins and felt his pulse stagger. _This isn't who I was a month ago._ He squeezed his eyes shut against the sting, but it didn't stop his breath from heaving out of him, nor his shoulders from quivering. _What the fuck is happening to me?_

Arthur huddled under his blankets, but he was too afraid of what dreams might be waiting for him to sleep.

* * *

><p>After speaking to Olivia and his father and cancelling his stolen credit cards, Arthur threw himself into work. He dug up every bit of information he had on the Platts and their extensive connections, from businessmen to fashion designers to politicians, searched arrest records and party invitations and even hacked into the Facebooks of Olivia and her friends. After getting no sleep the glaring monitor was murder on his weary eyes, but coffee kept him going, and he appreciated the relative structure and cold simplicity of working on his computer. He knew all the tricks, how to get in and out clean, how to search and subsearch and anticipate where things were hidden. It was all easier than thinking about the night before.<p>

His entire body was sore: his back, stomach, and jaw especially, from where he had taken the most serious blows. The pain in his hands and shoulders was of a different kind, deep and seething in a way that made his stomach lurch. A hot shower helped, but when the water seeped into the corners of his mouth, bringing with it the taste of blood, it reminded him of Eames.

Arthur tried not to remember. He tried not to dwell on the memory of Eames's broad weight pressing him into a lumpy mattress, smothering and satisfying. He tried not to lick his lips in hopes that the taste of a hot, full mouth was still there. He tried not to reach for his already half-hard cock, but his stinging fingers moved anyway, stroking it to fullness. With his forehead braced to the sweating tile he rocked into his fist, tentatively at first, unsure if he would even be able to properly get over his embarrassment enough to enjoy himself. It was a foolish worry-all he needed to do was think of taut muscle between his thighs and then he was panting, his hips pumping urgently against his shuddering grip.

_Fucking Eames._ Arthur moaned into the spray. _I hate you so fucking much right now._

When he was dry and clothed he noticed that his phone was blinking with a received message: Wallace had sent him a photo of a baby walrus with only a link as the subject. Though he had his misgivings he followed it, and frowned when it led him to a protected blog requiring a password.

"What are you up to?" Arthur muttered as he typed the address into his PC. The protection was no challenge for him, and soon he was scrolling through academic ramblings and photographs of modern buildings. Arthur was about to text Wallace back demanding an explanation when he noticed "dreams" listed among the blog's tags. He clicked.

Arthur made a few stops on the way to the new motel, and arrived with a lunch order of deli sandwiches in one arm, and a bag of tubes and instruments in the other. As soon as Bone let him in he deposited lunch on the table and reached under the bed for the familiar denim sack.

Bone helped himself to a sandwich. "How are you?"

"I'm fine." Arthur pulled a chair over to the bed and used it as a table on which to set up the almost-PASIV. "The security at my place is pretty good. I really doubt they'll come after me there." He dumped out his second bag and went to work.

"What are you doing?" Bone asked, eying him.

"I'm adding another slot." He used a rubber band to secure a third bottle to the device's crude casing. "All I have to do is rig an extra plunger, and connect it to the timer. It won't be pretty but it should work just fine."

Eames came out of the bathroom and paused. "Arthur," he greeted, his voice struggling into something that resembled concerned curiosity. He pawed through the lunch bag.

"Eames." Arthur refused to look up from his work. "I want all three of us to be able to dream together," he said. "I think I have a name for you, at last."

"Brilliant." Eames sat down on the bed, his weight jostling the mattress. Though he was uncomfortably close Arthur still did not look. He did his best to ignore the warmth of Eames's shoulder against his as he worked. "So who'll be dreamer and subject?"

"I'll be both."

Bone leaned his elbows against the back of the chair Arthur was working over. "It doesn't work that way," he said.

"Sure it can." Arthur attached his makeshift plunger to the timing device. "I just need to program in a longer delay, so that my mind has enough time to populate the dream before you and Eames join. I was reading about it online earlier."

Bone hummed, unconvinced, and Eames chuckled, his breath too close to Arthur's ear, turning it red. "Sure we can trust your projections today?" he teased.

"My subconscious is just fine," Arthur replied tersely.

After they were finished eating Arthur pushed his back to the headboard. Bone pulled the second chair over, and because the tubes only reached so far, Eames draped himself sideways over the foot of the bed. Arthur slipped the needle under his skin and only briefly thought of his father's disapproving stare.

Arthur reached back into his memory. It took a great deal of concentration to call up the necessary landscape without forcing too many of his own details on it: he would need to trust his subconscious memory more than his conscious one if he was going to fill it accurately, or so he had read. Within moments he was standing in the lobby of a condominium, surrounded by dozens of people dressed in various designer labels. Just outside, paparazzi bulbs flashed incessantly for every approaching socialite, and inside, men and women crowded the elevators and stairwell. The air was thick with gossip and sickly sweet greetings. Arthur was almost embarrassed to see his projections bearing so many false pleasantries.

"Some party," Eames said next to him. He was dressed to match his surroundings, in a slick, casual suit, his hair and whiskers just unkempt enough to be charming. Bone had not fared quite so well: his black suit was overly formal, and though his clean jaw and gelled hair were a credit to his looks, he was already shifting uncomfortably in the attire and looked woefully out of place.

"We'll work on that," Arthur said under his breath. He led his two companions to the line for the elevator. "This is the Ambergeen Tower building," he explained. "Owned by Meredith Platt. Every year she hosts this 'block party,' in which the whole place is opened up for guests. It's even part of the contract for purchasing a condo here. This is what it looked like last year."

"What does this have to do with our PASIV?" Bone asked impatiently.

"I think it's here." They crowded into the elevator, and Arthur pressed the button for the ninth floor. "Meredith's daughter is Olivia-she and I went to high school together. She usually takes over the entire ninth floor for her personal guests, and this year she mentioned she has something special to show me. When I hunted down some of her friends I found out that she's been asking around, trying to gauge interest for some kind of private 'event' she's holding. There seem to be about half a dozen of us."

The elevator stopped, and they piled out. The crowd on the ninth floor was younger than the rest of the building, comprised mostly of men and women in their early twenties. As soon as they were in the hall Arthur could hear Olivia's cackling laughter from the furthest condo.

"I feel like I'm missing something," Eames said.

"One of the owners here is a vet named Wesley Roth," Arthur continued, and Bone gave him a startled look. "He's Meredith's distant cousin-in-law or something. He was discharged from the army almost a year ago, due to injury. When I looked into his history I noticed there was a period of time on his record between being recruited and his deployment that wasn't accounted for."

Bone scraped the back of his palm across his mouth. "He was part of the Somnacin project," he murmured.

Arthur watched him closely. "How would you know that?"

"Because he was _in_ the Somnacin project," Eames answered for him. He grinned crookedly. "Go on, tell him. Was it Sargent Bone, or _Private_ Bone, eh?"

"Sargent Bone," he said, and then he moved ahead of them, through the crowd.

Arthur frowned at his back uneasily. He looked to Eames. "Really?"

"You mean, you couldn't tell?" Eames shrugged. "Personally I never made it paste Private."

"_You_ were a soldier?" Though it had never occurred to Arthur before, hearing it didn't surprise him. He looked again to Bone and back. "Then you two-"

Eames shook his head. "It's a longer story than that," he said. "And none too flattering. I'd rather let him tell it. So finish up-you think this Roth has our PASIV?"

Arthur burned with curiosity, but he shook himself and continued. "I think Olivia does," he said. "Or at least, she has access to it. From what I've been able to research, the original PASIVs were designed to connect six to eight participants at a time, and I was able to snare a message of hers to a friend where she said, 'there's room for two more.' Plus she's apparently a client of the same dealer that gave me Abida's name. Everything is pointing to this year's party."

_And then there's Wallace herself,_ Arthur thought as he let Eames digest the information. _She let slip that she'd be at Olivia's party on purpose. She's up to something for sure._

"So you're saying we've got to get ourselves on the guest list," said Eames. He smiled sideways. "Are you going to bring me as your date?"

Arthur's ears blushed, but he stared straight ahead. "I'll give you Roger's number. I'm sure he'd be happy to take you. Plus it'll be less conspicuous."

Eames laughed. "You know, Bone almost knocked my jaw off because of you. I think you owe me a little more than-"

"I'm sorry," Arthur interrupted. He moved down the hall, peering through the open doors. Only one was closed: Roth's condo. He tried to remember if it had been occupied at all at that point, but it was difficult to think with Eames still at his shoulder. "I got carried away."

"You're going to have to do better than that," said Eames.

He set his open palm against the nape of Arthur's neck, gentle but almost possessive, and it spread heat down Arthur's spine. Arthur took in a slow breath and turned toward him. "I was keyed up after the fight, and...you were there," he said carefully. "Nothing personal."

"Nothing personal," Eames repeated. "Then why are your projections looking at me as if I'm meat?"

Arthur glanced around, and made a face at the men and women that had stopped to stare at them. He pushed the hand off his neck but it didn't help. "Can we just forget it? I'm sorry about your jaw but-"

Eames lifted his hand to Arthur's face, stilling him. His fingertips were rough but their touch fleeting, concealing the strength Arthur knew was hiding behind them. When he scraped his thumb over Arthur's bottom lip it pulled at the brick-worn abrasions, stinging, and Arthur swallowed hard.

A man came at them. Arthur saw him pulling his fist back but he couldn't get the warning past his throat in time. He didn't need to-Eames twisted as if having sensed the incoming attack, and he had no trouble parrying it. Eames even grinned as he swung his arm and knocked the projection out cold.

"Oh Arthur," he said, cracking his knuckles as the other projections tensed in readiness. "At least your subconscious is predictable enough."

Arthur grimaced, and when another man charged he jumped past Eames and punched him square in the jaw. It wasn't enough to knock him unconscious so he struck again, throwing him into a group of women.

Bone leaned out of a far doorway. "What the hell is going on?"

The chatter and laughter from the other condos ceased, and more projections began to crowd into the hall. Their eyes were narrowed and anxious, but when Arthur really looked at them he realized it wasn't anger driving them.

_I want to see him._ Arthur watched as Eames shed his jacket and deftly handled another pair of advancing threats. His shirt clung to his muscled back and shoulders, and it made Arthur's mouth dry. _I want him to see me._ When a woman came at Arthur with a broken bottle he twisted his arm around hers and spun, tossing her into a short table and shattering the vases on it.

"We're practicing our escape!" Arthur called to Bone, who was still standing among the horde of projections, untouched. "Let's go!"

Bone looked unconvinced, but when a heavy-set man stormed past him with clenched fists, he kicked him in the back of his knee. As soon as the man dropped Bone took his head in both hands and twisted sharply, snapping his neck. Immediately the other projections turned their attention to him. "I'm starting to like this party better," he said, ripping his suit jacket off.

Arthur smirked, and when he looked to Eames, found him wearing the same expression. _Fuck it,_ he thought, as the rest of the party-goers charged at once. _I hate these people anyway._

The hallway erupted in an all-out brawl. Arthur had to remind himself that he was only dreaming, and that any soreness already in his limbs didn't apply; the pain faded and left his mind clear. There was something gleefully cathartic about punching the teeth out of his high class peers. His knuckles smeared their sycophantic smiles and patronizing glares into ugly red, his knees expelled the lies and gossip from their lungs. He scattered the users and the tools back into their boxes and felt his heart thud with every impact.

Swiftly, methodically, he tore his life of crafted masks apart from the inside. When there was no one left on the ninth floor he and his partners charged down the stairwell and burst into the eighth, and then the seventh, dispatching every socialite-turned-dream assassin. He could feel Eames at his back. Several times they crashed together in the cramped hallway space, and Arthur shivered with the press of Eames's chest to his back, or the rough caress of a fist when Eames targeted someone past him. Their eyes met and Arthur's tongue darted over his bottom lip-the taste of blood reminded him of their kiss. He even stood back for a while, content to watch Eames barrel through the projections with brutal authority. He was swift and powerful and Arthur envied him.

When they got to the fifth floor Bone suddenly tired of the brawling and dreamed up a gun. With the stock hard against his shoulder he fired into the crowd in a ghastly massacre. Arthur watched the bodies shred with a kind of sick fascination, wondering, _If he was a soldier, has he done all these things before, for real? _A gun appeared in his hand and he hefted its weight against his palm, thrilled and frightened. _It's not just the dream he's addicted to._

They spilled out into the lobby, but the party there had ended; police were swarming the streets outside the building with guns drawn. Bone charged at them without hesitation, his rifle spewing, but a bullet tore into his shoulder before he even reached the doors. He twisted, firing with one hand and killing some, but then his chest burst open under iron hail and he collapsed.

Eames grabbed Arthur around the waist and pulled him behind the lobby's front desk. Despite the bullets exploding all around Arthur spared a moment to appreciate the strength of the arm around him. "Time's almost up," Eames said as they huddled close together. "Shall we go out in a blaze of glory?"

Arthur heard the front doors opening. He leaned over the top of the desk and leveled his Glock, pumping bullets into the cops that were trying to enter. Eames was next to him a moment later, their arms pressed as they worked together to drive the invaders back. Even as they succeeded Arthur didn't bother to duck; he could see huge, round headlights speeding toward them from the street outside, and he knew what would happen next.

He looked to the man beside him. Eames was sweating, and bloodied, and grinning like a fool, and Arthur thought, _I want this._ He snapped one hand around the back of Eames's neck and dragged him into a fierce, possessive kiss. They twisted together just as the cab of a semi ripped through the building entrance and raced toward them.

Arthur awoke with a sharp, shuddering intake. There was sweat on his forehead and his pulse fluttered. He wanted to be ashamed of his visceral fantasies, which had just the night before caused him so much confusion and doubt, but it was too hard to regret anything when he opened his eyes and saw Eames watching him. Their gazes locked as they panted, and even when Arthur clenched his jaw he couldn't help the faint murmur of arousal that seeped out of him.

Bone was already pulling the needle out of his arm. He glanced between the two of them, made a face, and then swiped his wallet off the dresser. "I'm going to...go buy some smokes," he declared, as if it were a mission of grave importance. He hastily showed himself out.

As soon as the door closed Arthur tugged the needle out of his arm and crawled down the bed. Eames only had enough time to remove his own IV before Arthur was leaning over him, sealing their mouths in a kiss. The sting was back-his face ached with the pressure-but all he could think as his shoulders hunched was, _Do it, just fucking do it!_

Eames growled as if he'd heard him. He twisted his fingers in Arthur's hair and pulled, yanking them apart. Arthur hissed, but then Eames rolled on top of him, shoving him into the mattress with the weight of his body. He smothered Arthur's already bruised lips and pressed his taste into the roof of Arthur's mouth with his tongue. Arthur fought just enough to make known that he could win, if he wanted to; to carry over the momentum that had chased them through the dream. Eames caught on faster than their first time. He jerked Arthur's head back by the hair, tipping it over the edge of the mattress, and as he smeared his open mouth down the smooth line of his throat Arthur moaned, "Yes, yes."

It felt so fucking good. Arthur shoved and then pulled at Eames's shoulders as if grappling with him, even if it accomplished nothing except to rub their bodies together. When Eames's hand crept to his thighs, trying to urge them apart, Arthur made him fight for it. They writhed in sensual warfare on the rumpled blankets until Eames tried a new strategy: he simply lowered his weight and pumped his hips, rubbing the bulge in his jeans against the taut muscle below Arthur's navel. Despite the thick material Arthur had no trouble feeling the heat. He groaned, despising the hunger that had already robbed him of shame. When Eames panted against his ear he imagined his voice rumbling taunts and obscenities, and he couldn't take it anymore.

Arthur parted his knees; as soon as he had surrendered even that much Eames wormed between them and ground against Arthur's hips. Every thrust felt like _I told you so_ and Arthur made a sound embarrassingly like a whimper as his legs pawed up Eames's back. He arched and gasped, and when Eames's hard fly rubbed against his balls he was sure he could come right then if he wasn't careful.

Eames must have felt the same, because with a shudder he leaned back. He was flushed and breathless as he undid Arthur's fly and jerked his pants down. Before drawing them all the way off his hands became distracted, though-they slipped under Arthur's shirt to trace his ribs, then slid down, squeezing Arthur's waist, kneading their palms into the tender muscles at the crook of his thighs. Arthur lifted his hips, trying to remind Eames that it was his cock, wet and straining in his briefs, which deserved the attention. Eames's mouth quirked, and he looked as if he wanted to hold out, but his self-control wasn't faring any better than Arthur's, and he at last palmed Arthur through his underwear.

Arthur's head fell back, off the bed, as he let out a deep groan. He pressed up into Eames's calloused palm and murmured, "God, God yes, do it," wanting so badly to just surrender. "Don't stop."

"Shh, wait." Eames bent down and kissed him, and almost wasnt able to pull away with his lips intact. He groaned as he climbed off the bed.

Arthur heaved a sigh as his back flattened on the mattress. He kicked his pants all the way off and then stripped out of his underwear and tossed it at Eames's turned back. Deprived of a body to struggle against it was too easy to think of how ill-advised the indulgence was, and he gave his cock a few sharp jerks to remind himself that he didn't care if he was making a mistake, he wanted Eames on top of him again, inside him-

Eames returned, and before Arthur had time to curse two slick fingers slid into him. Arthur gasped and flinched, but when he tried to voice a complaint Eames pulled almost all the way out and then thrust back in. Though there was clearly some kind of lubricant involved it wasn't the good stuff Arthur was used to, and his body tensed and tightened against the intrusion. The burn traveled up his spine, but when his voice emptied out of him it was ragged with arousal. _Do it,_ he demanded with his eyes.

Eames licked his lips as he climbed onto the bed. His pants were down only just far enough, and Arthur had barely enough presence of mind to confirm the condom stretched over his impressive girth. Then Eames was inside him. The first stretch was the hardest, and Arthur dug his nails into Eames's T-shirt as his mouth fell open in wordless agony. He shuddered and squirmed and adjusted, until he could feel Eames's thighs flush against his skin.

Eames hissed above him, and though Arthur didn't have the strength to hold his head up he could just imagine his creased brow and lip between his teeth. He began to move. He started slow, his breath huffing with each solid thrust, but the restraint didn't last long. When Arthur dug his heels into the small of Eames's back he grunted and sped up, pounding with growing fervor into the clamp of Arthur's hot muscle.

_Yes, yes._ Arthur drew his knees up as high as he could and pulled, until Eames was resting on his elbows over him. Their kisses were breathless, coppery bites. Arthur's back throbbed but only the deep, seething fullness mattered, and when Eames pulled on his hair again he lost whatever control he had left. His voice tore out of him in wordless pleas as he rode Eames's ever-quickening thrusts, and he clawed at him, sweating and throbbing, distantly wondering when he would wake up.

When Arthur came he shot so hard and trembled for so long that he thought his entire body were emptying against Eames's stomach. His hips jerked and his skin simmered-he could only just barely feel Eames's mouth against his throat over the sensation of release. For those thundering moments he felt the full impact of days of frustration, of confusion and disgust and shame, but more importantly, of freedom. The sob that choked his throat was so sincere it almost brought tears to his eyes, and he thought, _This__ is what I want. I want all of this._

Eames kissed him. He was still fucking him, and Arthur surrendered. His entire body felt raw, tingling, and he couldn't stop touching Eames's strong shoulders, his taut abdomen, his slack lips. He wanted to crawl right up inside him and sleep until everything made sense again. By the time Eames spasmed against him in climax he was already half conscious, and then, as Eames licked the sweat off his upper lip, he fell under.

He didn't dream.

* * *

><p>Arthur awoke half naked, tucked beneath the sheets of a cheap motel bed. He remained very still at first, trying to remember how he had gotten there and what had happened, but it wasn't until he tried to move and found his lower back in anguish that he remembered.<p>

"Fuck," Arthur hissed. He reached behind him and dug his knuckles into the tight muscles, but after taking a knee from a thug and then getting fucked into an old mattress, he felt as if his entire spine needed realigning. He shoved his face into the pillow to catch his pained grimace and a low whimper. _Fuck that hurts._

It wasn't about to go away. With a sigh Arthur forced himself to sit up and stared blearily into the room. He was alone. He stared fixedly at the bed, then the bathroom, then the other bed, expecting Eames to suddenly manifest in any of those places, but nothing stirred. Relief and disappointment churned over in his stomach, and when he thought he had enough strength to get up, he headed into the bathroom for a much-needed piss.

Once he was dressed and cleaned up as best he could be-a proper shower would have to wait for his apartment-he grabbed the last sandwich off the table and headed outside. His body still felt raw and new to him, as if he had shed layers of skin. _What am I going to tell him, when I see him?_ he thought with slack shoulders as he closed the door behind him.

He took a bite of ham and cheese, but when he noticed a turned back just in front of him, he almost choked on it. The short crop of dark hair made it obvious that it wasn't Eames, but Arthur winced anyway as he circled. He would have liked to make a swift and anonymous getaway, but Bone was seated on the sidewalk right in front of his car, and he had little choice but to acknowledge him.

"Hey." Arthur stopped just in front of him. He smiled awkwardly. "Sorry about that."

Bone glanced up from his cigarette. His face was calm and unreadable. "It happens."

The answer threatened to put Arthur's imagination to work, spinning visions of Eames's other lovers that had chased Bone out of cheap motels. He shoved it to the back of his mind. "You weren't sitting there the whole time, were you?" he teased, seeking comfort in a different possible source of embarrassment.

"Nope."

He offered up his box of cigarettes, but Arthur shook his sandwich. As he took another bite of the ham he found himself sitting down on the hood of his car. Bone didn't seem to mind the company, so he took a chance. "Can I ask you something?"

Bone sucked languidly on the filter. "Was I really a soldier?"

"Yeah."

"Do you find it hard to believe?"

Arthur frowned around another bite. He looked over Bone's sculpted biceps, his unruly whiskers, and the tattoo just visible around the slope of his shoulders. "No," he said. "Not really. It just didn't occur to me before."

Bone flicked ash off the end of his cigarette, watching it fall with narrowed eyes. After a moment's contemplation he looked back to Arthur. "I was deployed in Afghanistan," he said. "My boys and I joined up with a German squad patrolling the area around Kunduz. We took fire. That's when I got this."

He lifted his shirt, displaying a knot of scar tissue in the center of his chest. Arthur leaned forward and winced. "How did that not kill you?" he couldn't help but ask.

"Luck." Bone smoothed his shirt back down. "Bullet lodged in my sternum. I've got a fake in there now." He rapped his chest with his knuckles. "Wasn't out of the hospital two weeks when they invited me into the project."

"The Somnacin project."

"Yeah." His lips twitched in a brief, bitter grin. "They thought that my experience in the field would make for a more 'vivid' dream setting. Scare the piss out of their new recruits, then build them back up, you know what I mean? Let them get a taste for it."

Arthur wrapped up his sandwich; his appetite was gone. "Essentially, desensitization training." _Not unlike what he's been doing to me,_ he thought uneasily.

"'Course, they didn't know what they were doing," Bone went on. "Neither did we. The recruits started complaining to the doctors about nightmares, the kind you wake up screaming from. More than half dropped out. The rest didn't want to work with _me_ anymore." He snorted. "Roth was one of those. They got someone to replace me but the project was already considered too costly, in more ways than one. So they shut us down and sent us packing."

It was all very easy to imagine. Arthur had no trouble picturing Bone's snarl as he curled his hands around his rifle, teenagers with freshly-shaved heads cowering beneath him. _What does that make me,_ he wondered, _that I've been coming back for more?_ He licked his lips. "But you were already addicted by then, weren't you," he said.

Bone stared blankly ahead. "Yeah."

_So are you_, a voice said at the back of Arthur's mind: Eames's voice. Days before he had looked on Bone's downcast eyes with pity and even hate, but at the moment he wasn't sure what emotion it was tightening his chest. He didn't ever want to look like Bone did then.

"I need it," Bone said abruptly. He paused to take a breath off his cigarette and Arthur waited, quiet and patient, for him to continue. "I don't want to dream without it again, ever. It's gotta be on my terms."

And then it made sense. Arthur leaned back as he thought of the first dream they had shared in the dusty wasteland, of the scar hiding beneath Bone's thin undershirt, of bullets and teeth and a look of shame. Of Bone's offer when they walked back from the field.

"When I was thirteen my mom and I were in a car accident," Arthur said, the words spilling out of him. "She was killed almost instantly. Months later I thought...I would have given anything to never have another nightmare about it. And then they stopped." He smiled grimly. "Until you showed up."

Bone stared up at him. He returned the smile, slowly, and Arthur could almost hear him say, _Ahh__, so you do know._

They were interrupted by a man's shoes scuffing on the pavement. Arthur glanced over and managed not to wince when he saw Eames watching them. He worried at first about how long he had been there, but then realized it didn't really matter. "Hey," he said.

Eames smiled, and had the decency to look awkward as he came closer and held up a plastic shopping bag. "I bought you something."

Arthur accepted the bag and investigated, turning up a six pack of beer and a box of Icy Hot back patches. He snorted with good humor. "That's actually...very sweet of you," he said. "Thanks."

"Do you want me to go?" he asked. "Looked like you two were having a moment."

"No, it's fine." Arthur tossed his half-eaten sandwich into the bag and slid off the hood. "I should be going; I have a job to plan."

Bone snuffed his cigarette out against the curb and stood. "That wasn't part of our arrangement."

Arthur shook his head. _I have to see it through, now._ "It doesn't count as going into the field if I was invited to the party anyway," he said. "I'll text you the building address so you can check it out yourself. I should be able to get some photographs of the inside or even a blueprint before the party, too."

Arthur glanced to Eames and hesitated; the look on Eames's face was so damn calm and easy that he didn't know how to interpret it. He sighed. "I kind of wish I could get a look at your projections right about now," he said.

Eames smiled faintly. "I don't open my mind-"

"-To extractors, I know," Arthur finished for him. Despite the compulsion to speak the truth he held back, and only offered a smile of his own as he opened the driver's side door. "I'll be in touch."

He drove off, sore as hell and full of questions, but oddly at ease.


	4. Chapter 4

Inception, its characters and settings, do not belong to me, and are being used here without permission and for no profit. This fic is rated NC-17 for graphic violence, sex, language, addiction, and non-con. Written for the Inception Reverse Bang with partner birddi.

**The Paradox Job**

Part 4

* * *

><p>Arthur arrived at the Ambergreen Tower building just after ten in the evening. He had dressed up, in three pieces with a new waistcoat and a patterned, plum necktie. He told Olivia he had chosen it to match the bruises still purpling his jaw and almost received a slap. After much swearing and a forced tear or two, she forgave him for the scare and whispered in his ear, "Meet me on twelve at one."<p>

The party was already in high and drunken spirits. Arthur picked his way casually from floor to floor, engaging pleasantly with the familiar faces. He received many startled looks and sympathetic winces for the injuries still healing on his face, and he was happy to tell an embarrassing story about him and Olivia fleeing in terror from back alley thugs. More than one woman offered to kiss him better.

When he had a moment to himself he texted Bone. _12th floor, 1am. Penthouse._

Within seconds the reply came: _Ready_.

Arthur was tempted to ask where he was, but he held back. _He knows what he's doing. We all have the layout mostly memorized-it's going to be fine._ Instead, he texted Roger to find out which floor he was on.

The elevator opened onto the fifth floor, and Arthur felt a chill. As he stared down the crowded hallway he couldn't help but imagine bodies reeling and spattering. Some of the people milling about in the doorways were even the same as his projections, or close enough, their voices clanging in a ruckus fit to be gunfire. Arthur moved through them swiftly, his smile charming, trying not to imagine blood on the walls or a Glock in his hand.

He spotted Eames in the condo at the end of the hall: he was standing in the open door of the balcony as a night rain pattered outside. He had one hand in his pocket, the other pressing a cigarette between his full lips. The city lights glistened off his slick cheeks and eyelashes as if he had been caught outside at the rain's onset; combined with his distinctive profile and faraway eyes he looked like an old Hollywood painting, or maybe a photography major's first lucky snap of an art he couldn't understand yet.

Eames glanced back, and when he noticed Arthur watching him, he smiled. It put very unprofessional butterflies in Arthur's stomach, but he came over anyway. "Enjoying the party?" he asked.

"Sure." Eames smirked around his cigarette. "My date just went to find me a beer."

Arthur glanced away and spotted Roger in the kitchen, chatting with a group of their peers. When he managed to catch Roger's eye he waved, sending him back into the refrigerator for another beer.

"I feel kind of bad," Eames said. "I'm pretty sure I broke his arm in that dream of yours the other night."

Arthur frowned; he didn't remember Roger being there, but then, he hadn't been exactly clear. _You have a job to do,_ he reminded himself, and he turned quickly back to Eames. "Olivia invited me up to the twelfth floor at one in the morning. It's her parents' penthouse and there'll probably be security. Think you can find a way up?"

"Oh, I'm sure I'll think of something," he replied.

Roger came over with the beers, and had much concern to shower on Arthur for his bruises and scrapes. Arthur laughed it off, and shared a slightly more heroic version of the story he had been passing around the party all night. He only took a few sips of his beer as the conversation turned to lighter topics.

At one Arthur made an excuse to leave, and cast Eames a brief but meaningful look as he disengaged. Eames winked. It shouldn't have been so reassuring.

Inside the elevator Arthur pulled out his phone, pretending to text. As soon as the elevator doors opened onto the twelfth floor he snapped a picture and sent it to Eames thinking it might be useful to him, but when he raised his eyes he found himself being watched by a barrel-chested black man wearing a tailored suit and an earpiece. Immediately the security guard reached for his phone.

"There you are!" sang Olivia. She danced forward and grabbed Arthur by the arm, pulling him out of the elevator before the guard could. "You're almost late, you know," she said as she led him through the sitting room. And then to the guard, "This is the last one! No one else is allowed in, all right?"

"Yes, Miss Platt."

Arthur looked left and right, trying to take stock of everything he saw and compare it to the plans he had compiled for Bone and Eames earlier in the week. Past the small sitting room was the spacious great room, decorated with a crisp, modern esthetic, all hardwood floors and white leather sofas. Seated around the glass coffee table were two more men, three women, and Wallace, dressed in her usual leather bustier and strapped pants. The others he recognized as well: people from Olivia's short list of trusted friends that also doubled as Wallace's clientele. They were all speaking in hushed, excited tones.

"All right, everyone's here," Olivia said as she moved around them, motioning Arthur into a seat on the end of one sofa. "I hope you're ready." Her eyes sparkled, and she leaned over the coffee table, running her fingertips over the silver briefcase poised on top of it. She tipped it onto its side and flicked the latches open.

The lid popped up, and everyone leaned forward as Olivia slowly unveiled her prize. Though from the outside it looked to be nothing more than a sleek business accessory, the inside of the case was filled with gleaming electronics, glass beakers, and coiled tubes. Arthur's eyes widened as he surveyed its clean lines and strong build, so different from the mess of soldered parts that made up Bone's replica. He was immediately envious and he couldn't help but ask, "Where did you get it?"

Wallace cocked an eye at him, and he almost detected a warning therein. Olivia, however, looked only amused as she replied, "My mother bought it. She's been absolutely horrid about it-made me promise not to tell a soul." She glared at each of them in turn with sudden ferocity. "Which means you'd all better keep your fucking mouths shut."

Everyone nodded, and a few chuckled nervously to each other. "So how does this work?" one of the girls asked. "We get to watch you dream?"

"More than watch." Olivia motioned to Wallace, who bent over the device with her and began pulling out the IV lines. "I've got the best dream all set up for you," she said, tapping the side of her head. "You're going to love it, trust me." Her tongue flickered over her upper lip as she glanced to the two men next to her.

The IVs were handed out, and Wallace helped insert the needles. When she got to Arthur he waved her off and did it himself. He barely felt the sting anymore. Once everyone was seated and ready he turned his wrist down and pinched the hanging IV tube tightly between two fingers.

"Ten minutes," said Wallace as she programmed the PASIV's timer. "Of course, it'll feel like a lot longer when you're under. Ready?"

Olivia settled into her chair and closed her eyes, grinning. "Do it."

Wallace pressed the plunger, and with a quiet hiss the device engaged. Arthur closed his eyes and waited for a few seconds, listening to the bodies around him settle and go still. When he heard footsteps padding away he peeked with one eye and saw Wallace moving swiftly into the next room: Meredith's home office.

_Up to something_, he thought as he tugged the needle out of his wrist and let it snap back into the briefcase. _I knew it._

Arthur cast a quick glance to the closed front door and followed her, his footsteps silent even on the hardwood. He expected robbery, but was surprised when Wallace sat herself down at Mrs. Platt's laptop and booted it up. She bypassed the screensaver password easily and immediately began clicking through saved files.

"I doubt she keeps her coke in there," Arthur said from the doorway.

Wallace whirled, but when she saw who it was she sighed and immediately went back to work. "Tricky Arthur," she chided. "I knew you were up to something."

"Likewise." He pulled out his cell phone as he moved behind her. "What are you after? You _wanted_ me to be here, didn't you?"

"I thought I might need your help to get in here," she said, jutting her chin at the laptop. A few keystrokes later a security alert popped up. "There. See?" She hopped out of the chair and gestured for him to take her place. "If you'd be so kind."

Arthur frowned, but he dialed and then tucked his phone against his shoulder as he dropped into the chair. "What am I breaking into, exactly?"

"Just get in, and you'll see," Wallace said, leaning against the back of the chair.

Arthur reached into his inside jacket pocket, pulling out a micro-USB that he always took with him into the field. Once in place it went right to work, executing a program of his creation to get through the laptop's security.

Eames answered his phone. "Yeah?"

"The PASIV is here," he said as he watched the progress on the screen. "Olivia and her friends are under now, but won't be for long. I can't exactly steal it while they're hooked up, though." He glanced at Wallace, and she raised her eyebrows, but had no objections.

"Do you want me up there?" Eames asked. "I got your photo, but-" Arthur could _hear_ him smirk "-I think I can take him."

"Probably, but it's Olivia I'm worried about. The timer only has a few minutes on it, and if she wakes up to us stealing from her, she'll-"

A sharp procession from the front hall made him and Wallace turn. It was followed by the unmistakable thud of a body hitting the floor, and then the lights in main room flickered, a few of them shutting off.

Arthur frowned. "You'd better get up here."

Wallace crept to the door and closed it until only a sliver was left open for her to peek through. Her bare shoulders hitched with the sound of the great room's main door being slammed open. "Damn it," she whispered. "I knew I shouldn't have waited this long." She backed away as heavy footsteps stomped through the condo, and men growled to each other.

"What's going on?" asked Eames.

Before Arthur could answer, the computer beeped. He turned back and saw "complete" flash across the screen. Despite the commotion going on outside he leaned over the keyboard and clicked through the documents his program had listed as being protected. Most were videos and other obviously personal files, but a few were labeled in strings of numbers and upper case letters. He opened a PDF and scrolled through to what looked like a technical manual.

_It's PASIV instructions,_ he realized when he came to the first illustration. Another file was labeled almost the same way and he hastily opened it, revealing paragraphs of cited sources and long medical jargon. He scrolled through until he came across a diagram made up of joined hexagons and connecting letters.

"It's the formula," he said, stunned, taking in the Y shaped configuration of molecules. He dropped his phone as his fingers flew over the keys. "Eames, it's the formula for Somnacin-here on Meredith's computer!"

Wallace leaned over his shoulder and shoved his hands away from the keyboard. He started to reach for them again-he only needed a few keystrokes to email the files to himself-but then Wallace pulled a vile out of her pocket and overturned its contents onto the laptop. A clear liquid seeped between the keys and immediately began to eat through the plastic, hissing as it contacted the metal blow. The screen distorted and then went black.

Arthur had just enough time to snatch his USB out as he lurched back. "What the hell are you doing?"

The door to the office burst open, and a heavy-set man dressed in a repairman's uniform blinked at the two of them in surprise. "There's someone in here!" he called over his shoulder.

Arthur snatched up the laptop by its screen and heaved it at him. It caught the intruder in the chest and caused him to stumble out of the doorway just enough that Arthur was able to dart past him with Wallace on his heels. As they retreated into the great room Arthur spotted three more men inside, who were busy placing hoods and leg restraints on Olivia and her unconscious guests. They all glanced up sharply; two of them were badly bruised and their eyes gleamed with angry recognition.

_The assholes from the alley,_ Arthur knew at once. He spotted a handgun shoved into the belt of one and turned to make a run for the exit, but another man was already leaning against the doors. The click of a hammer stopped Arthur in his tracks.

The man, a toned African American in a designer suit, limped away from the door. "You must be Arthur," he said.

Arthur glanced down at the man's feet; one was not nearly as flexible and responsive as the other. "You must be Mr. Roth," he replied in kind. "Did you tell Meredith about the PASIV so she'd bring it here? Make it easier for you to steal?" He pursed his lips. "Why did you have your boys rough me up when you knew it was here all along?"

"I wanted to know how much you knew-see if you would interfere with my plans."

Roth shoved the silencer attached to his handgun into Arthur's stomach. The pressure was cold through his vest, and Arthur's pulse quickened, but then he told himself, _It__ doesn't matter if he shoots you; you'll just wake up._ It made his face calm as he stared his attacker down.

"Who are you working for?" Roth demanded. The rest of the men finished their task and fanned out behind Arthur and Wallace, surrounding them.

"No one," said Arthur, shrugging, feeling the gun drag against his skin. "I just wanted that PASIV for myself."

"Then there's no reason to keep you around." Roth curled his finger around the trigger.

"Wait," Wallace said quickly. She squeezed Arthur's hand, and smirked. "It's not in your best interests to kill him."

Roth snorted. "I'm just here for the PASIV, and it's right there. So-"

"The formula for Somnacin was on that computer," Wallace said. She tipped her head toward the broken laptop in the office doorway. "It's pretty much useless now, but Arthur saw the formula before it was destroyed."

Arthur stared at her. "What are you doing?"

The PASIV beeped, and with gasps Olivia and her guests began to wake up. One by one they came to the realization that they were tied into place, and they began to squirm and shout in panic. Olivia especially could be heard cursing vigorously through the sack on her head.

"The formula may still be in his subconscious mind," Wallace continued regardless. "And I'm sure you know how much it's worth. There's only one way for you to get it now."

Roth's brow furrowed, and Arthur felt a cold shudder pass through him when narrowed eyes fell on him. Arthur fell back a step. "You're not going into my mind," he said.

Roth motioned to his hired muscle, and two of them stepped forward to grab Arthur by the elbows. He jerked, and managed to get away from one, but then a third wrapped his arm around his neck from behind. The last of the men detained Wallace as Arthur was dragged, kicking and swearing, to a nearby chair.

"Get off me!" Arthur shouted, but the arm around his neck tightened, making his face throb and his lungs ache from deprivation. By the time they forced him into the chair he was light-headed, but he still struggled weakly as they pinned his wrists to the armrest. "I saw it, all right? But I don't remember it!" He watched with mounting panic as Roth ripped the IVs out of Olivia's guests and dragged the PASIV over to them. "Get that the fuck away from me!"

"Have you even done an extraction before?" one of the men asked as Roth reset the PASIV timer.

"I know how it works," Roth replied, sliding a needle into his skin. "Give us ten minutes, and if it doesn't work, we'll just shoot him." He helped two of his men with their needles and then pulled out his phone and dialed a number. "In ten minutes, hit it," he instructed to whoever was on the other line. "And keep an eye out-that rat is here and he's probably got friends around." He hung up.

Arthur continued to fight, but then one punched him soundly in the gut, forcing air out of his lungs and bile into his throat. He choked and couldn't force enough strength into his arm to free it from the approaching IV. The puncture spread goose bumps up his arm. "Don't," he wheezed. "Stay the fuck out of my head!"

Roth pressed the plunger, and Arthur slumped as the drug flowed into his system, his last conscious thoughts of Eames.

* * *

><p>The party was dreadfully generic. Everyone was dressed to their best and he still managed to stand out, weaving through the familiar faces as they gossiped over their parents' wine. In an hour or two the alcohol would loosen tongues and make things more interesting, but Arthur was already on his way out.<p>

_This party is pointless anyway,_ he thought as he moved through the halls. _I might as well leave._ He checked his phone for any messages he might have missed. _Or try to get some real work. _

Arthur was considering texting a stranger when five steely fingers wrapped over his face. He fought, but it wasn't until he heard his phone crack on the hardwood that he became angry. He jabbed with heels and elbows as he was dragged into the guest room, and thrilled when his captor grunted in pain. He almost managed to get away but then the man twisted, heaving him to the floor.

"Arthur!" a familiar voice snapped. The door slammed shut and locked. "Calm down, it's me."

Arthur scrambled to his feet but then the room began to spin, and he had to brace his palm to the wall to get his bearings. He rubbed his eyes, and suddenly everything came back to him. "Bone?" When he looked again he realized it really was him, and he heaved a sigh. "What the hell was that for?"

Bone advanced on him, his face as hard as Arthur had ever seen it, and he backed away involuntarily. "I want it," Bone said. "Right now."

"What?" Arthur's back hit the wall, but rather than feel fright, indignation flushed his cheeks. "What are you talking about? What are you doing here?"

"The formula!" Bone slammed his palm into the wall just beside Arthur's ear. "I know that's what Roth is trying to extract from you. Show it to me, right now!"

Arthur sighed. "Can't this wait? Aren't we..." He glanced around them and was suddenly disoriented-he couldn't remember where he was or how he had gotten there, until Eames's little smirk recharged him. _That was Roth-him and his goons. _"We're under," he said, and all the laughing and cheering voices from within the house immediately ceased. "Are you real, or-"

Bone growled impatiently. "Forget about that!" He turned toward the guest room's dresser and cleared it of its lamp and other accessories with a sweep of his arm. When he slapped his hands on the bare top a laptop appeared, and he hastily booted it up. "You're getting me that formula."

Arthur pushed away from the wall as it all came back to him. "Is Eames here, too? How did you get here?"

"Platt's security are all dead," Bone said as he dragged a chair away from the vanity and shoved it in front of the loading computer. "Eames and Wallace are looking after the thugs. Now come _on_." He grabbed Arthur by the arm and yanked him into the chair.

Arthur sat down with a thud. "Calm down," he said, but was given pause by the look on Bone's face. He had seen him anxious in their dreams before, even furious, but the eyes on him then were wild and almost panicked. His fingers felt cold. "_You're_ trying to extract from me, too?"

Bone leaned back, and his jaw worked, but he couldn't answer. His hand was clenched and trembling around the back of the chair. _It's__ worth more to him than the PASIV_, Arthur thought, and with a shake of his head he turned to the laptop. _More than me, even. That's fine._ He took a deep breath and reached into his inside pocket for his USB, retracing his steps. "This could have waited until we got out, you know," he said.

"Sorry," Bone grumbled. He scraped the back of his palm over his mouth. "Sorry."

_What was it that blog said?_ Arthur closed his eyes, grateful that the rest of the party was still quiet as he concentrated. _Knowledge can't be unlearned. If I saw that formula only a few minutes ago, it should still be in here._ He glared down at the laptop and it shifted, becoming Meredith's brand. He plugged in his USB and it went to work just as it had in the condo. _If Eames is taking care of Roth's men up top, that means the Eames I just saw was-_

"Well?" Bone asked impatiently.

"It's working. I think." Arthur watched the progress of his program, remembering how he had called Eames, followed by Roth and his men breaking in, and then... "There was a PASIV manual in there," he said, and it appeared on his screen. He scrolled through and then closed it. "Roth's men were coming closer, and I clicked on..._this_ one, and..."

The diagram appeared. Arthur lowered his eyes, concerned that his imperfect memory might distort the image. _The subconscious mind is stronger than the conscious one,_ the blog had said. _Sometimes you just have to get out of its way._

Bone leaned over the keyboard. His lips moved, whispering the letters over and over, repeating the configuration. Arthur stayed quiet and out of the way, until the walls gave a shudder. He closed his eyes. _Now all we have to do is get out._

* * *

><p>Arthur woke up. It wasn't with a jarring gasp after a horrible death that he was used to, but it left him shaken. He blinked at the unfamiliar surroundings and jumped when he noticed Roth and his two goons stirring; the other two were slumped in a corner, unconscious. Arthur tried to move, wary that there might be more threats waiting, and found Bone leaning against his knees.<p>

"Hold on," said Eames, close to his ear. Strong hands touched his arm and pulled the IV out. "Are you all right? Steady, there."

Arthur wavered in his seat, and when he could get a good grip on Eames's arm he used it to help pull himself upright. "Thanks." He stared down at Bone as he packed up the PASIV. He sighed, but he couldn't bring himself to be angry. "You got what you wanted?"

Bone snapped the case shut. "Yeah."

"I'm sorry," Eames said, giving Arthur's elbow a gentle squeeze. "I tried to tell him no."

Arthur shook his head. "No, it's all right. I understand."

Across from them, Roth twisted and groaned. When he pulled on his arms and found them bound to the armrest with his necktie he swore and immediately began to fight, but blanched at the sight of Bone pushing to his feet. "Fuck..._you_?"

"Told you you couldn't get away from me," Bone grumbled. He shoved the PASIV case into his duffel and slung it over his back. "Let's go."

Before he could take a step, the lights went out. The condo was plunged into darkness except for the neon signs gleaming through the far windows, which was only enough for Arthur to make out the barest outlines. His hand tightened reflexively on Eames's arm. He turned on Roth for an explanation but was halted again when a clanging bell screamed to life over their heads. Olivia and her friends screamed as the fire alarm filled the condo and left their ears ringing.

"What is this?" Arthur grabbed the front of Roth's shirt. "You set the goddamn building on fire?"

"I'm not an idiot," he spat. "But the alarm makes for a decent escape."

"Let's go," Bone said again. He started across the room with Wallace close behind. "With the alarm there might be cops soon."

Arthur started to follow, but when he heard Olivia whimper he changed course. "Hold on-we have to get these people out."

"We don't have time," Bone protested.

"Then go ahead! I'll catch up."

Arthur pulled the sack off Olivia's head. Tears had made a mess of her makeup and she immediately spat at him. "What the fuck is going on? Who the fuck tied me up?"

"Hold on, I'm getting you out." Arthur unmasked the rest of her guests, and when he bent down to untie Olivia's legs found Eames doing the same for the man next to her. He smiled around a wince. "Thank you."

"Hurry up, yeah?" Eames moved down the line.

Arthur turned to aid the women as well, but found Bone and Wallace were already there, helping them off the sofa. Relieved, he untied Olivia's wrists. "The elevators won't be working because of the alarm," he told her. "We'll take the stairs down."

"Where's the PASIV?" she croaked. "My mom's gonna fucking kill me."

"It's safe, don't worry." He helped her up and nudged her in the direction of the door. "Hurry, just go."

"That PASIV is mine!" Roth screamed as Olivia and her guests made a run for it. "Don't you dare take it! Someone fucking shoot them!"

Arthur ran for the exit, his peers close behind. He could hear Roth's chair scraping the floor as he rocked and struggled, and knew their impromptu restraints wouldn't hold him long. _With the alarm everyone will be evacuating. All we have to do is run out with everyone else, and disappear. Job complete._

Gunshots barked across the room, drowned out far more effectively by the wailing fire alarm than the silencer. Arthur almost wasn't even sure at first if he hadn't imagined it, until he heard the clink of shell casings to the hardwood. He dove for the open doorway, and as he skidded into the closed elevator door he felt a body crash into him from behind. The hot chest against his back sent his heart into his throat and he whirled. "Eames?" He reeled, pulling Eames out of range of the entranceway. "Shit, are you-"

"I'm fine-I'm not hit." Eames pushed the door to the stairwell open. "Watch out for the body."

Arthur ducked through. He could hear Olivia's telltale cursing, already a floor below amidst the sirens and flashing red emergency lights. Wallace came through after him, and he helped her past the corpse of a security guard. "Go," he told her, "but I'm getting a full story out of you later, I swear to God."

"Thanks for your help," Wallace chirped, and with a shaky smile she rushed down the stairs.

Eames and Bone came through, and dragged the corpse over in an attempt to block the door. "Fucking goons woke up," Bone grumbled as he started down the stairs ahead of them. "They'll be after us in-"

Bone jerked. He didn't make a sound, and then he was falling back into Arthur's knees. As they tumbled to the ground Arthur looked past, and saw a man running up the stairs toward them. His gun was out and his finger was on the trigger. "Don't move!" the man snapped. "Where's Mr. Roth?"

Eames hopped over his two partners, and even when the gun fired he didn't stop, punching their attacker in the jaw. The man tripped over the stairs and fell, landing on his head with a horrible crack on the landing below. Arthur watched, his breath held, until he was sure he wasn't moving before drawing his attention to warm fluid seeping into his pant leg.

"Bone?" He wriggled out from under him as carefully as he could, and supported him as he looked him over. Blood was pouring down his chest, black in the red lighting, and Arthur let it stain his hands as he followed it back to the source: a ragged bullet wound that had torn a hunk of flesh out of Bone's collar. "Shit," he hissed, patting himself down, but he didn't have so much as a handkerchief to cover it with. "Shit, Eames."

Eames rejoined them and leaned over Bone. When he probed the wound bluntly with his fingers Bone jerked and shoved at him. "Fuck!" Bone slapped his hand over his collar and groaned. "That fucker... Is the PASIV all right?"

Eames snorted. "He'll be fine," he said to Arthur. "Help me get this off him."

As they wrestled the duffle off Bone the twelfth floor door began to rattle, and when it opened a crack Roth's angry shouting filtered through. Eames yanked the duffle onto his own back and then tried to pull Bone upright, but he had trouble getting his legs beneath him.

"I fucking hate getting shot," Bone whined as it took Eames and Arthur together to get him on his feet. His eyes were wide, and his skin was already clammy to the touch.

Arthur gulped. The blood was sick and sticky on his fingers, and the lights and siren were making his head pound. "Come on," he said, grabbing Bone's belt as he helped him down the stairs. "Don't be a baby-the hero never dies from a shot to the shoulder, remember?"

Bone groaned. "I'm not your fucking hero."

The door continued to bang above, and below, Arthur could hear shrieks and angry shouts. Everything was too loud and maddening but he had the presence of mind to remember, _Roth was talking to someone on the phone. There are more of them below, probably in the basement, since they cut the power. They'll be on their way up._

"Take him," Arthur said, pushing Bone against Eames. "I can't hold him and someone has to take point."

Eames pulled Bone's arm over his shoulders and ignored his pained groan. "What are you going to do?"

"Just keep up." He crouched down next to the thug Eames had dispatched and stole his gun. _This isn't a dream_, he reminded himself as he led the way down the stairs. _I can't just kill everyone-or anyone._ He took a deep breath and slicked his hair back with his sweat. _But I can still do this. I can do anything._

They had only gone down two floors when they ran into another gun-toting goon. He caught Arthur by surprise and fired almost immediately-Arthur could have sworn he felt the breath of the bullet against his neck. The man was fast but Arthur made himself faster, smashing the heel of his hand into the bridge of his nose. As he fell back Arthur pursued and wielded the heel of his gun into his temple, knocking him to the floor.

A hammer clicked back. Even in the screaming stairwell Arthur heard it, and he turned to see a man on the ninth floor landing. He was raising his arm, and without thinking Arthur pounced. He sailed down the flight of stairs and crashed into the man's chest, flinging them both into the wall with a bone-jarring impact. His joints ached but it didn't stop him from kneeing the man unconscious.

"Jesus." Eames stumbled after him with Bone still clutched to his side. "You do know we're awake this time, don't you?"

Arthur pulled himself upright. "It doesn't matter," he said, and realized with a kind of out-of-body clarity that it was the truth. _Dream, reality, it's all the same._ _I can do this._ His heart fluttered and he took in a deep breath as if trying to savor the sensation. _I want this._

A gunshot smashed into the concrete wall behind them, and Arthur pushed his partners ahead of him. "Keep going," he said. "I'm right behind you." He twisted his stolen gun around the corner and fired at too high of an angle to hit anything but ceiling, but he heard men shout and scatter. He stopped, waited for Roth and his thugs to collect themselves, then did it again, emptying the magazine in his attempt to buy time. When he pulled the trigger and got only a click he abandoned the weapon and charged to the next floor.

"They're going to catch up with us at this rate," Arthur said. He reached into Bone's jacket and pulled out the familiar Glock 17. "Keep going, and I'll cover you."

Eames turned back. "No-we go together. Or take him, and I'll stay."

"I can't carry him," Arthur insisted. "Just go, before they catch us all!"

"I don't need to be carried," said Bone, but when he tried to step away from Eames's side his knees wobbled. He was still bleeding heavily and Arthur glared Eames down, willing him to understand. _Like hell I'm letting you stay behind._

Eames ground his teeth, but the shouting from behind them spurred him on. "We'll meet you downstairs," he said, as if it were an order. His face was hard as he yanked Bone down the next flight.

Arthur opened the door to the eighth floor and ducked inside, leaving it open just enough that he could see the upward stairs. _You can do this,_ he told himself, making each breath a slow, deliberate deliver of oxygen. The siren faded to white noise at the back of his mind; the soreness seeped out of his limbs and shoulders and back; his hands tightened around the gun, firm and still. _Focus. All you have to do is be faster than them. You can do that much._ He took another deep breath in, closed his eyes, let it out. _Be as good as Eames thinks you are._

A man stepped onto the landing. Arthur's eyes flicked open but he waited, his shoulder to the door, until the steps passed by him. _Do it_, he thought, digging his boots into the carpet. _Do it!_

Arthur threw his weight into the door. It swung open with all the force he could muster, smashing the man in the back and sending him tumbling down the next flight. Another almost crashed right into him and he swung his arm, elbowing him in the throat. It was a good hit-he felt muscle spasm beneath his triceps-and he continued the rotation, throwing out his foot into another man's stomach. He didn't know how he did it, only that there were men in front of him, and Eames behind, and a gun clutched in his hand he didn't dare use.

Roth leveled his weapon. Arthur knew that he would, and he used the handle on the open door as leverage to propel him back into the eighth floor hallway. Bullets ricocheted off the open fire door and he heard a scream, but it didn't stop him. He twisted and fired into the ceiling, just twice, giving himself time to dive into the nearest open condo.

"You fucking junkies make me sick!" Arthur called, pressing his back to the wall just beside the open doorway. He glanced around but the condo was empty, having been swiftly evacuated. _Follow me-don't follow them. Follow me. _"You're worse than that asshole Boner. At least he knows how to perform a proper extraction."

Roth stormed into the hallway; Arthur could hear the uneven tread of his limp. "You're in way over your head, kid. Give me the PASIV and we'll make a deal! You're not really ready to die for that hunk of crap, are you?"

_No, not for that._ Arthur's breath came faster despite his attempts to calm it. _For him?_ A self-deprecating smile twisted his lips. _God, I'm so hopeless._

Bullets howled through the open doorway, and Arthur jumped, scurrying deeper into the condo. It occurred to him too late that he had given himself away to a bluff. As the men charged after him he ducked into the kitchen and dove behind its tiled island. More gunshots cracked tile and splintered the IKEA cabinetry, and with a thrill of fright Arthur knew he was pinned down.

"Just toss it out," Roth taunted. "It's not worth it, you little puke."

"Sure it is," Arthur whispered. He pressed his back into the wood behind him and felt it shift. _It's on wheels,_ he thought, and when he heard Roth limp onto the tile he braced his heels to the cabinets and pushed as hard as he could. The island swerved, and even before he was sure that it would hit Arthur scrambled to his feet. He jumped, sliding across the island on his hip, and his momentum carried him straight into one of Roth's remaining thugs. As they tumbled to the ground he swung his arm, pistol-whipping the man across the face. Blood poured from his nose and he cried out, rolling over.

Fingers closed around his neck from behind. Arthur started to fight but then simply aimed the Glock over his shoulder, and was swiftly released. As soon as he was free he twisted onto his back and kicked his attacker soundly in his left kneecap. Something snapped, and the man collapsed next to his peer. Another kick to his face left him unconscious.

"Son of a-" Roth, partially doubled over the corner of the island, raised his pistol. They were too far apart for Arthur to retaliate and there was nowhere for him to take cover. He swung his gun forward. His finger was tense around the trigger, and for the briefest of moments he thought of all the projections he had killed, their heads popping open in a spray of gore. He aimed, and he pulled.

Roth fired, but he was already hit; his ankle shredded beneath lead and he dropped, throwing his aim off enough that the bullet buried into the carpet three feet from its target of Arthur's head. On his hands and knees he tried to fire again but Arthur jumped on him and twisted his arm around his throat.

"You _fuck_," Roth growled. He tried to roll but Arthur jammed his knee into the floor and pulled on his wrist with his other hand, pinning them. "That was...my good foot!"

Arthur licked the taste of blood off his lips. "I'm not nice," he agreed.

"Arthur!" Eames rushed into the condo, and by the time he located Arthur and Roth outside the kitchen the latter was already sagging into unconsciousness. He stood back, looking over the two downed men and their boss with wide, blinking eyes. "Are you all right?"

Arthur craned his neck to see him. "What are you doing back here?" He felt Roth go limp beneath his arm and released him. At first Roth felt _too_ still, but when Arthur gave his shoulder a shake, he took in a choking breath. He wheezed weakly against the carpet.

Eames came forward and offered a hand in pulling Arthur upright. "I couldn't leave you to take the five of them yourself," he said, but then he looked over Arthur's work again, and his eyebrow quirked. "I guess I underestimated you."

"Yeah." Arthur shoved the Glock in the back of his pants. "So did I."

They raced together down another two flights, to where Bone was slumped against the wall, his palm shoved into his open wound. He was pale even in the off lighting and when Arthur touched his arm, he felt him shiver. "He's losing a lot of blood," Arthur said as he helped Eames haul him to his feet again. "You shouldn't have stopped."

"I told him to," Bone grumbled. He pulled something out of his pants pocket and shoved it directly into Arthur's. "Soldiers don't leave men behind."

"I would have gone back anyway," Eames retorted, so defensively that Arthur smiled.

They stumbled down the last floors, and were greeted in the lobby by police with weapons drawn. By then Bone was more red than otherwise and they had little trouble convincing the officers that they were victims instead of threats. A path cleared for them, and by the time they were at the entrance paramedics were rushing forward. As Bone collapsed onto a stretcher Arthur moved close to Eames's side, their shoulders rubbing. "He'll be all right," he said.

Eames nodded. "Yeah, he's fine."

A pair of cops stopped in front of them. "We need you to tell us what's happening up there," said one.

"Some asshole was trying to rob Ms. Platt," Arthur replied. "We found that guy in the stairwell when we tried to make a run for it."

The officer eyed Eames's duffle. "Then what's _that_?"

Arthur and Eames exchanged a look. Eames's eyebrows rose, asking, and Arthur sighed. "Fuck it," he agreed.

Eames punched the officer full in the face, and at the same time Arthur flung the other aside. Together they charged into the street, where the city's elite were crowding up and down the sidewalk like miserable, rain-drenched cattle. Arthur weaved through them as easily as if they were his own projections. With Eames at his side he ran, letting the rain wash the blood from his hands and cool his pulse as it raged close to his surface. He was escaping and he was free, and when he cast a brief glance at the sky he saw a glint of the moon peeking through the clouds. It was round and huge, and he laughed at it, pushing himself faster, until his limbs ached and his time ran out.

* * *

><p>Arthur awoke shivering. The sounds of the city were all around him, blaring and keening, and dewdrops splashed off his eyelashes when he went to open them. He was met with his own haggard reflection in the dusty Plexiglas of a bus stop enclosure. He closed his eyes again. His entire body was throbbing as if on fire, and all he wanted was to bury himself deeper into the body that was his pillow. So he did.<p>

A warm nose nudged the top of his head. "You awake?"

Arthur groaned a negative, but slowly it came back to him, and he had little choice but to open his eyes again. He was sitting on a bus stop bench, drying but still mostly damp, huddled against a strong and welcoming shoulder: Eames. He let his breath out slowly as if it were an experiment. "Where are we?"

"I'm not exactly sure," Eames admitted. His voice was a rough, warm rumble stirring Arthur's hair. "Far away from where we were, at least."

Arthur rubbed his eyes and looked around, though he tried to do it by moving as little as possible. "Oh. I know where we are." _My place is three blocks down. Damn, we came a long way._

They fell quiet. The rain had stopped, leaving behind a shredded and weary cloud canopy through which the first light of dawn was spilling. Everything was soft and yellow and gray, and Arthur sighed. He watched the shadows redefine themselves on the sidewalks, content not to think about what had happened, or where Bone and Roth were, or if the police were still chasing them. He was too exhausted to move and it was the most peaceful he had felt in days.

"Are you all right?" Eames asked.

Arthur gave the question much longer consideration than was needed. "Yeah," he said. "I am." With a deep breath he straightened and rubbed the crick out of his neck. "Are you?"

Eames rotated his shoulders. "I'm perfect."

Arthur glanced down at the duffle between Eames's feet. "All that, for this," he murmured.

Eames was quiet a moment as if debating. "Not worth it?" he asked.

"I don't know." Arthur snorted quietly with good humor. "_I_ don't get to keep it."

Again Eames hesitated. "Well. You _could_."

Arthur frowned intensely down at the bag and thought of the sleek silver PASIV inside. A pulse went through him, fluttering and eager, and a future blossomed inside his mind. He pictured himself floating around the globe, darting into one city and then the next as easily as he had moved from one of Roth's thugs to the other. He could feel Eames at his back and by his side and between his thighs. It was so tempting that he ached, but when he looked to Eames and saw the look of reckless hope restrained in his eyes, he shook his head.

"No," Arthur said. "Thanks, but I don't think your little team is ready for me."

Eames snorted, and then laughed. "You might be right," he said. "You really might be." With a groan he pushed to his feet.

Arthur straightened. "Where are you going?"

"I've got to figure out which hospital they took Benny to, and then spring him," Eames said, hoisting the duffle onto his back. "He has a record, so it shouldn't take too long for the cops to figure out who he is. I figure we'll head south before trying to leave the country."

"Do you need my help?" He started to get up. "I could-"

"No, no. You've done your part." Eames smirked. "And then some. There's a chemist back in Kenya that'll pay out his arse for that formula you got us."

Arthur sagged into the bench and tried hard not to look as deflated as he felt. "Will you tell Benjamin something for me? Tell him...thanks." He rubbed his nose. "For everything. I mean it."

He nodded as if having understood some deeper meaning behind the words. "Sure."

They both fell silent, and Arthur remained very still even though he felt as if he were squirming in his skin. "So," he said. "I guess that's it, then."

Eames started to answer, but then shook his head. Without another word he stepped in front of Arthur and leaned down to brace his hand on the back of the bench. Arthur only had to tip forward to meet him for a kiss. Eames's lips were hot against his, his tongue gently seeking, as if he were trying to convey a message. Rather than attempt to interpret Arthur slid his hands to Eames's jaw and held him close as he delivered his own.

_When we meet again, everything you think I am will be true_, he thought. After the kiss ended he kept Eames close a moment longer and tasted a sigh against his lips. _I'll be ready for you._

Eames kissed him again and then finally pulled back. "I'll stay in touch," he said, and Arthur believed him. "But next time, I want to meet _your_ team."

"Deal." Arthur smiled. "But only if you introduce me to your projections."

Eames chuckled. "We'll see," he said, but by the time he turned to go his grin had softened. "Take care of yourself, Arthur."

"You, too."

Eames moved to the curb; Arthur watched until he managed to wave down a taxi and speed off down the street. Once he was out of sight Arthur sank deeper into the bench and closed his eyes. Despite the weight of fatigue his body felt alive and new to him, and he sighed, getting used to it. He could still taste Eames against his mouth.

_He'll never know what all this meant to me,_ Arthur thought, licking his lips. And he liked it that way.

Someone sat down on the bench next to him. At first he was too tired to look, but then the stranger edged closer, until they were touching. It was a woman's narrow shoulder pressing into his, and he cocked one eye open. He sighed. "There you are."

"It took me a while to find you," said Wallace. She set a McDonald's coffee on his knee. "Thirsty?"

Arthur made a face, but he knew he would need the caffeine if he was going to make it back to his apartment. The first sip burned his tongue but he drank it down anyway. "I hope you're here to apologize for using me," he said.

Wallace smiled sheepishly, and to his surprise immediately offered, "I'm sorry. When I found out that you were after the PASIV I wanted to tell you, but until I knew who you were working for I couldn't risk it."

"Tell me what?"

"That I was hired to get to it, too." She took a sip of her coffee and turned toward him. "When Abida's team hit the general's mansion they also hacked out the formula. We go way back so he sold me some of the Somnacin they lifted, but of course when I tried to sell it myself an extractor found me. She said if I was able to get into this party and destroy the formula she'd let me join her team."

"Her team?" Arthur scoffed. "You? An extractor?"

Wallace's face grew hard, and there was something familiar in her determination. "I'm getting out," she said firmly. "I'm sick of pushing coke and smack on your yuppie friends. This is my chance to do something-_be_ something-and I thought..." Her eyes crinkled at the edges. "...maybe you'd like that chance, too."

Arthur's heart skipped. "By that do you mean you're going to lure me to this friend of yours so she can hack the formula from my brain herself?" he asked warily.

Wallace waved her hand dismissively. "She already has it," she said. "And a PASIV-a real one, top of the line." She leaned forward. "And we could use you. Please say you'll consider it."

Arthur shifted, and remembered suddenly the bulge in his pocket. He slipped his hand inside and felt out the shape of a motel room key. _Can't be an extractor with just that,_ he thought, picturing Bone's denim sack waiting for him under the bed. He glanced down the street in the direction Eames's taxi had gone. _Can't be an extractor by myself._His chest swelled and he took a deep breath. _I need this._

"I'll consider it," he said. He took another long gulp of the coffee and pushed to his feet. "But I'm too tired to think straight right now. Give me some time."

Wallace smiled up at him; she had seen through to his answer already. "All right. Oh!" She reached into her pocket and pulled out his cell phone. "You dropped this at Olivia's."

Arthur accepted the phone and checked it for damage before slipping it into his pocket. "Thanks. I'll text you later when I decide, all right?"

"Sure. Thanks for your help tonight, Arthur."

She went back to her coffee, and Arthur left, limping only a little as he headed down the three blocks toward his apartment. He was sore and soaked and exhausted, but when he thought of the bottle hiding in his nightstand, he smiled, remembering the stretch of golden beach that awaited him.


End file.
